Fujifilm Toyama Chemical, a subsidiary of Fujifilm, has announced the transfer of its radiopharmaceutical business to PeptiDream, a Japan-based bio-venture company.
The healthcare technology company has reached a share transfer agreement with PeptiDream. The transaction is expected to close in March next year.
Under the terms of the agreement, Fujifilm Toyama Chemical’s radiopharmaceutical business will be succeeded to the new company, through an absorption-type split.
All the outstanding shares of the new radiopharmaceutical company will be transferred to PeptiDream.
Fujifilm is eligible to receive a total of JPY30.5bn ($277m), in addition to potential milestone payments based on the progress of the business succeeded by PeptiDream.
In combination with PeptiDream’s peptide drug discovery development technology, the radiopharmaceutical business of Fujifilm Toyama Chemical is expected to have synergistic effects on drug discovery.
Fujifilm aims to advance its business growth in healthcare, as part of its medium-term management plan, dubbed VISION2023.
The company is currently expanding its healthcare business in the areas of Medical Systems business, which deals with medical devices and medical IT.
Also, it intends to expand in the area of life sciences business, which deals with bio CDMO, drug discovery and pharmaceuticals.
Fujifilm Toyama Chemical is expected to continue its ongoing development of new drugs, and expand its contract manufacturing of antibacterial agents.
The company will leverage its manufacturing facilities and infrastructure for a formulation using lipid nanoparticle formulation, a type of Drug Delivery System (DDS) technology.
Fujifilm Toyama Chemical would support the Japanese Government vaccine production system through development and manufacturing contracts for mRNA vaccines.
In October last year, the company has partnered with VLP Therapeutics Japan, a subsidiary of US-based VLP Therapeutics, to manufacture the latter’s Covid-19 vaccine formulation.
Furthermore, the company will seek further growth by expanding the contracted area to the field of next-generation pharmaceuticals such as nucleic acid pharmaceuticals.
