PowderJect buys Sweden's SBL

PowderJect Pharmaceuticals of the UK has entered into an agreement withActive Biotech AB of Sweden to acquire the latter's wholly-owned subsidiary SBL Vaccin AB, the country's leading vaccine company. The firm has annual revenues of around L16 million ($22.7 million), and PowderJect is going to pay L50 million for the acquisition in a mixture of cash and stock.

PowderJect's chief executive, Paul Drayson, told the Marketletter that the deal will provide the firm with a sales and marketing infrastructure which it has previously lacked and, perhaps more interestingly, a distribution deal already in place with Aventis Pasteur.

Dr Drayson claimed that the acquisition "is another key step in PowderJect's strategy to become a major player in the global vaccines market," adding that its franchises now include "the rapidly-growing flu and travel vaccine markets, both of which are ideally suited to our strategy of concentrating on non-traditional marketing channels."