Asterand widens service offering with UK Good Laboratory Practice membership

Asterand PLC (LSE: ATD), provider of human tissue and human tissue-based services to pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies engaged in drug discovery, said its UK facility in Royston has been accepted as a member of the UK Good Laboratory Practice (GLP) Compliance Monitoring Programme.

With this membership, the company is immediately able to offer GLP compliant preclinical services to its pharmaceutical and biotech clients. This positions Asterand to provide its pharmaceutical and biotech customers with one of the most comprehensive human tissue service programmes available worldwide, the group said in a statement.

General manager of UK operations Tony Brown commented: "We are extremely pleased to add GLP compliant studies to our growing suite of PhaseZERO (human tissue-based) services. Our key customers are the world's top 30 pharmaceutical companies, who increasingly look to source a broader range of services from external providers. This acceptance into the UK GLP Compliance Monitoring Programme allows us to broaden our service offering and provide more opportunities for our customers to develop ‘one-stop shop’ partnerships with Asterand.”

Asterand's UK service division offers scientific expertise in human tissue research. Through its PhaseZERO service platform the company has more than 14 years experience in providing multinational pharmaceutical companies with compound evaluation, target and biomarker validation studies.

With the ability to offer GLP compliant studies as part of the PhaseZERO services, Asterand is now adding preclinical safety studies for regulatory submission to its services in the areas of molecular pathology, compound potency, efficacy, disposition and safety. Asterand's initial GLP compliant offering is tissue cross reactivity testing. Such studies are required by the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) and the European Medicines Agency (EMEA) as part of the safety package supporting clinical development of therapeutic antibodies.

A fortnight ago, Asterand completed  its acquisition of BioSeek Inc. Asterand announced its plan to buy the privately-held BioSeek for up to US$14 million in cash and shares back in November 2009. The newly created BioSeek LLC entity is now a wholly-owned subsidiary of Asterand. 

The acquisition marked Asterand's first step in its "buy and build" strategy, which intends to consolidate leadership in the global human tissue and human tissue based services market. The company believes that BioSeek is highly complementary to Asterand's business in terms of both products and services offered.

BioSeek has developed proprietary human cell-based, high throughput assay systems (BioMAP). The systems are designed to replicate the intricate cell and pathway interactions that are present in inflammatory, autoimmune and cardiovascular diseases.

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