New Platforms Enhance AMRI's Discovery Biology Offerings

ALBANY, N.Y., Sept. 4, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- AMRI (NASDAQ: AMRI) announced today that it has expanded into the protein market, with an initial focus on protein expression and purification. The global revenue of the total proteomics market is anticipated to grow at a compound annual growth rate of about 4.1% to about $9.2 billion by 2018¹.

AMRI's current and ongoing activities – as part of its New York State Public-Private Partnership in Buffalo, N.Y. – encompass the production of purified recombinant proteins as reagents and tools for biological assays and sterile, pyrogen-free materials for proof-of-concept, non-human in vivo studies. Current production capabilities range from a scale of 1 to 100 milligrams. The protein expression systems and methods of focus are E. coli, mammalian and baculovirus.

"As a company with a deep history of discovery innovation, we continue to explore scientific solutions that provide our customers with enhanced flexibility and access to state-of-the-art science and technologies," said Michael A. Luther, Ph.D., MBA, Senior Vice President of Discovery and Development at AMRI. "We are very excited to be able to offer these expanded biology services as we continue to work with our customers, partners, CNSE, and the State of New York, to provide relevant drug discovery services, cutting-edge platforms and expertise to academia and the global Bio-Pharmaceutical industry from early discovery to candidate selection and beyond."

"Under Governor Andrew Cuomo's Buffalo Billion Initiative, we look forward to working with AMRI to provide these vital new services at the Buffalo Medical Innovation and Commercialization (BMIC) Hub to support pharmaceutical development, technology optimization, and related research and development opportunities," said Michael Liehr, Executive Vice President of Innovation and Technology and Vice President for Research of the SUNY CNSE/SUNYIT institution, a lead partner in the BMIC Hub. "The expansion to protein R&D will further leverage scientific knowledge and expertise to produce industry-changing results for stakeholders at every level."

As part of its aim to provide customers with high-value services in the area of biology and pharmacology, AMRI unveiled an IND-enabling support services platform in March 2014. This platform of services is aimed at supporting the successful initiation and completion of customer IND programs. As part of this offering, AMRI now provides in vitro DMPK studies related to drug-drug interactions and metabolism, which are routinely included in IND submissions.

About AMRI
Albany Molecular Research Inc. (AMRI) is a global contract research and manufacturing organization that has been working with the Bio-Pharmaceutical industry to improve patient outcomes and the quality of life for more than two decades. With locations in North America, Europe and Asia, our key business segments include Large Scale Manufacturing (LSM) and Discovery and Development Solutions (DDS). The LSM segment includes Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (API) and Drug Product Manufacturing, which supports the commercial cGMP manufacturing of complex APIs, starting materials, clinical formulation development and aseptic fill and finish. Our DDS segment provides comprehensive services from hit identification to IND, including expertise with diverse chemistry, library design and synthesis, in vitro biology and pharmacology, drug metabolism and pharmacokinetics, as well as natural products. For more information about AMRI, please visit our website at www.amriglobal.com or follow us on Twitter (@amriglobal).

About AMRI Discovery and Development Solutions (DDS)
Bolstered by over 20 years of strong scientific expertise and contributions to drug discovery and development, Discovery & Development Solutions (DDS) provides a suite of comprehensive scientific solutions from design to execution for early drug discovery to IND Investigational New Drug (IND) and beyond. We offer biological and pharmacological capabilities from assay design, development and implementation to reiterative lead optimization, as well as DMPK, formulation, and regulatory support. In addition to library and compound design, synthesis, and process design with rapid scale-up, AMRI provides diverse chemistry experience including, but not limited to, flow, biocatalysis and commercial-focused process chemistries, as well as capabilities in separation, analytical, bioanalytical and formulation sciences. AMRI also has expertise and capabilities from collections to manufacturing for natural products and semi-synthetics. For natural products, we can screen, profile, isolate and elucidate novel and unique products as well as scale the production for these natural products using our bio-processing capabilities.  

AMRI and the BMIC Hub
The Buffalo Medical Innovation and Commercialization Hub (the "BMIC Hub") at Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus is a new public-private pharmaceutical research and development initiative in Buffalo, N.Y. announced by New York Governor Andrew M. Cuomo in December 2012. The BMIC Hub is a collaboration that involves AMRI and other industry partners to provide life science discovery services, cutting-edge platforms and expertise to academia and industry from early discovery to candidate selection and beyond.

1. Source BCC Research "Life Science Tools and Reagents: Global Markets" January 2014.

SOURCE AMRI