Under the terms of the FIX agreement Octapharma will have licence to use BAC’s anti-FIX ligand for the purification of FIX from mammalian cell culture. Under the terms of the G-CSF agreement BAC will perform ligand discovery and development to provide an anti-G-CSF ligand, which will then undergo feasibility studies at Octapharma.

Dr Laurens Sierkstra, CEO of BAC said: “The progression of the Factor IX programme from feasibility study to scale up, and the initiation of the G-CSF project, are significant in our ongoing relationship with Octapharma, All the team here at BAC are delighted that our anti-FIX ligand has proven to be such a good fit for Octapharma’s downstream processes, and we are looking forward to working on its scale-up and developing a new affinity ligand for G-CSF.”

“It is important for Octapharma to have access to a technology for the development of affinity resins that are completely free of animal-derived components,” said Kim Björnstrup, vice chairman of Octapharma Group. “This is important for us to be able to fulfil our continuous intentions to provide a safe product portfolio. The BAC affinity ligand concept has fulfilled this need, and in addition has been a powerful tool in the purification process, facilitating a final product of highest purity.”