Strides Arcolab has agreed with the shareholders of Diaspa S.p.A, Italy to acquire their fermentation assets near Milan, Italy. The acquisition would be carried out through a special purpose vehicle incorporated in Italy, which will be owned by Strides Arcolab International Ltd [SAIL]. The acquisition is subject to closing conditions and necessary approvals. The company has not disclosed other details.

Commenting on the proposed acquisition, Arun Kumar, vice chairman and managing director of Strides Arcolab Group, said "The acquisition on closure will give Strides immediate access to a US FDA and EU approved facility with strong history of technology and fermentation skills. A significant part of Strides dosage form businesses are based on fermentation Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients [APIs]. Diaspa delivers the integration needs for Strides in this crucial space. We further intend to harness the existing customer base and product capabilities of Diaspa. This will allow us to become a leading player in the fermentation space with the latest technology with the management bandwidth of Diaspa that comes along with the acquisition".

Diaspa was founded in 1969 as one of the leaders in the fermentation industry. Since then many things have changed, but Diaspa still maintains its leadership position in this highly technological field.

The product portfolio has greatly increased to include not only a vast part of the antibiotic classes, but also different products classes like polysaccharides, phytostimulines, etc. Diaspa is able to address all fermentation technologies, either batch or fed-batch, and all types of metabolites: primary, secondary or biotransformations.

Beside the expansion in fermentation products Diaspa has expanded also its downstream capacity, and now is able to recover products from broths and from cells, both soluble and insoluble, to produce high quality products in agreement with all the major pharmacopoeias.