Acquisition Enhances Discovery Services

Charles River announced today that it has completed the previously announced acquisition of the CRO services division of Galapagos NV (Euronext: GLPG), which includes both Argenta and BioFocus. The acquisition positions Charles River as a full-service, early-stage contract research organization (CRO), with integrated in vitro and in vivo capabilities from target identification through preclinical development.

Located in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands, Argenta and BioFocus provide a full suite of drug discovery services from target discovery through the delivery of clinic-ready candidates to a broad range of pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. Their deep in vitro expertise includes medicinal chemistry, target discovery and validation, and complex in vitro biology, as well as therapeutic area expertise in respiratory, inflammation, oncology, and CNS diseases. The significant capabilities of Argenta and BioFocus’s more than 340 scientists augment Charles River’s scientific leadership.

James C. Foster, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer of Charles River Laboratories, commented, “The acquisition of Argenta and BioFocus is precisely in line with our strategy to build a broader portfolio of essential products and services to support the drug discovery and development continuum and the increasing virtualization of the biopharmaceutical industry. Argenta and BioFocus’s upstream in vitro capabilities are an excellent fit with our in vivo expertise and will enable us to engage with our clients earlier in the drug discovery process. This enhances the value we can provide to our clients because it allows them to outsource integrated drug discovery and early-stage development programs to a single provider. We believe that this acquisition expands our unique drug discovery and early-stage development focus and advances Charles River’s position as a market leader in the fast-growing outsourced discovery services market.”