Intas plans to go for FDA nod for its newly acquired Ankleshwar API unit

The Gujarat based company acquired the biotech unit from RPG Life Sciences

Ahmedabad-based Intas Pharmaceuticals Ltd, which bought the Ankleshwar biotech unit of RPG Life Sciences, is looking at getting an USFDA nod for this active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) manufacturing facility soon.

The deal size is estimated to be around Rs 25 crore or so. However, the same could not be verified. Intas has funded the acquisition from internal accruals.

A senior official of Intas Pharma said that the company felt that it needed more backward integration as far as fermentation based APIs are concerned, and that way this deal made strategic sense. "We already manufacture APIs for our oncology segment, however, we did not have much presence in the fermentation based APIs," he said.

The backward integration would help Intas save time as they plan to enter new product segments using these APIs, and it is also keen on getting a nod from the US drug regulator for the Ankleshwar facility so that it could use it for formulations for the US market.

Fermentation based APIs are used for oncology products, a segment which Intas is bullish about, apart from some other formulations in the immuno-suppressant segments among others.

RPG Life Sciences, on the other hand, has sold it Ankleshwar biotech unit to focus on the formulations business.