PPD introduces comprehensive laboratory services for vaccine and biologic drug development

PPD, Inc. (Nasdaq: PPDI) today announced it is launching the PPD Vaccines & Biologics Center of Excellence, a first-in-kind comprehensive network of integrated, world-class laboratory services focused specifically on vaccine and biologic drug development. The center augments the company’s scientific and biologics drug development expertise with state-of-the-art facilities, processes and instrumentation to help clients realize the highest scientific standards for their programs with a focus on cost efficiencies.

“With the industry’s largest collection of commercial vaccine assays and strong immunochemistry, cell culture and cGMP lab operations, PPD is the first CRO to offer the type of laboratory support that has the potential to bring significant efficiencies to the development of vaccines and biologics”

Bringing together more than 20 years of PPD laboratory expertise, the center will offer comprehensive laboratory services to support development of products such as vaccines, monoclonal antibodies, peptides, protein-drug conjugates and other biologics. The integration of vaccine testing, bioanalytical, cGMP and global central lab services will offer biopharmaceutical companies the opportunity to streamline and customize laboratory services for their biologics portfolios. The Center of Excellence strengthens PPD’s position as the industry leader in providing testing services for vaccines and other biologics, two of the fastest-growing segments in the biopharmaceutical industry today.

“With the industry’s largest collection of commercial vaccine assays and strong immunochemistry, cell culture and cGMP lab operations, PPD is the first CRO to offer the type of laboratory support that has the potential to bring significant efficiencies to the development of vaccines and biologics,” said Christine Dingivan, M.D., chief medical officer, PPD. ”The Vaccines & Biologics Center of Excellence provides the high quality scientific support our clients are seeking in a way that allows them to bypass costly capital and resource investments necessary to develop and maintain these capabilities internally.”

PPD has developed new technologies and assays to expand its vaccine testing services into the area of oncology vaccines in addition to now having the unique capability to provide comprehensive concurrent use testing for investigational pediatric and adolescent vaccine programs. Concurrent use testing of new vaccines is a regulatory requirement intended to ensure that vaccines under development do not interfere with the efficacy of marketed vaccines co-administered to the same patient population.

The center will also allow PPD to bring its clinical trials expertise across multiple areas, the most significant being data management. For example, PPD can address data integration challenges by providing a consistent sample management and data integration interface among the clinical database, central lab and vaccine lab environments.

The biologics and vaccines markets are among the fastest growing segments in the biopharmaceutical industry. According to EvaluatePharma, the compounded annual growth rate of biologics is expected to be 8.5 percent from 2008-2014, eight to 10 times greater than the growth rate of small molecules.

PPD’s Vaccines & Biologics Center of Excellence builds upon the strategic collaboration PPD established with Merck involving vaccine testing and assay development.