Caprion Biosciences Acquires the Immune Monitoring Laboratory from ImmuneHealth

MONTREAL, Sept. 13, 2016 /PRNewswire/ - Caprion Biosciences announced today that the company has acquired the assets of the immune monitoring laboratory of ImmuneHealth, ASBL. Located in Gosselies, Belgium, the ImmuneHealth laboratory will provide a fully operational immune monitoring laboratory infrastructure with well-established expertise, quality processes and industry services track record, which Caprion will leverage to expand its immune monitoring offering and strengthen its business partnerships and research collaborations throughout Europe. The ImmuneHealth lab also possesses complementary expertise and assays for cellular and humoral immunity that will help support Caprion's efforts to further diversify its services offering in the areas of infectious diseases and vaccine development.   

As a leading global provider of specialized immunology and proteomics analytical laboratory services to pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, Caprion is positioned for continued growth particularly in the rapidly expanding R&D services for immune oncology therapies, precision medicine biomarkers and biologics drugs.  Caprion has achieved strong growth in recent years based on rapidly expanding client demand for the high quality differentiated services of its ImmuneCarta® platform for monitoring immune response of patients in clinical development of drugs that involve the immune system, as well as for its ProteoCarta™ proteomics platform for the identification and quantification of proteins for biomarker discovery and validation, and for quality control in the manufacturing processes of biological drugs.  

This announcement marks Caprion's first acquisition since it was recapitalized in July with GHO Capital.  With favourable trends in immuno-oncology and proteomics, Caprion will continue to expand its capabilities on a global scale. Martin LeBlanc, President and CEO of Caprion stated: "This European expansion is a core part of Caprion's strategy to strengthen our competitive positioning and expand our service offering to better support our pharma and biotech clients as part of their global and European clinical trial initiatives. The opportunity to partner with the outstanding operation and team of the ImmuneHealth lab also provides us with an immediate access to an exciting new network of business partners as well as a vibrant research environment for building scientific collaborations in Belgium and Europe".   

Dominique Demonte, Chairman of ImmuneHealth said: "Caprion's expertise and vision will support the deployment of the services developed at ImmuneHealth on a broader scale and will create a natural bridge between Canada and Wallonia to promote strong business partnerships. This acquisition is therefore very good news for ImmuneHealth clients and for the development of our region".

With its two locations in North America and Europe, 120 employees including 70 PhD and/or MSc degrees, Caprion is now well-positioned to support the global clinical immune monitoring needs of its biopharma partners. Caprion will continue to operate from its headquarters in Montreal (Canada) as well as from its new location in Belgium under the leadership of Caprion's current management team. 

Financial details of the transaction were not disclosed.

About Caprion Biosciences, Inc.

Caprion Biosciences is the leading provider of proteomics and immune monitoring services to the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry.  Its immune monitoring business unit, ImmuneCarta®, offers proprietary multiparametric flow cytometry services for functional analyses of innate and adaptive immune responses.  Caprion's proteomics business unit, ProteoCarta™, offers proprietary gel-free, label-free mass spectrometry (MS) for comprehensive, quantitative and robust comparative measurement of proteins across large sets of biological samples for the discovery and validation of protein biomarkers. Caprion also leverages ProteoCarta and ImmuneCarta to develop its own in-vitro diagnostic products targeting cancer, metabolic and infectious diseases.  Caprion has been providing large-scale proteomics and immune monitoring services to over 50 major pharmaceutical and biotech clients for more than 15 years.  For more information, please visit www.caprion.com.

About ImmuneHealth

ImmuneHealth was founded in 2007 by the Université Libre de Bruxelles as a CRO offering human biospecimen procurement as well as immuno-monitoring testing for clinical trials in the fields of vaccines, immunotherapies, cell therapies and diagnostics.  Over the years, the Gosselies-based CRO has built its recognition for its cellular and humoral immunity analytical services provided to biotech and pharma clients.  Through its clinical unit, operating in compliance with clinical regulatory and ethical guidelines, ImmuneHealth has also established a strong clinical network supplying its partners with human biological samples through a prospective approach with access to a large panel of healthy donors and clinically characterized patients. Through the announced transaction, ImmuneHealth transfers its immune-monitoring laboratory to Caprion and retains the activities of its clinical unit. For more information, please visit www.immunehealth.eu. 

About GHO Capital

Global Healthcare Opportunities, or GHO Capital Partners LLP, was founded in 2014 as a specialist healthcare investment adviser based in London. Its vision is to apply global capabilities and perspectives to build a world-class healthcare specialist private equity firm by recognising and seizing the highly attractive and underpenetrated European market opportunity. The firm has a powerful combination of transaction, investment and industry skills which sets it apart from traditional private equity firms. For further information, please visit www.ghocapital.com.

SOURCE Caprion Biosciences, Inc.