(Yicai) Jan. 14 -- Bide Pharmatech, a Chinese producer of organic reagents and bulk drug intermediates, is teaming up with two investment funds to purchase 100 percent equity in Combi-Blocks for USD215 million, with the ultimate aim of taking over the US lab reagent supplier.

A joint venture set up by Bide and the two funds has signed an asset acquisition agreement with the shareholders of Combi-Blocks, the Shanghai-based firm said yesterday. Bide holds 49 percent equity in the JV and plans to up its stake through the issuance of new shares to the two partners and raise additional funds so as to take control of San Diego-based Combi-Blocks.

Bide halted trading of its stock [SHA:688073] today and the suspension is expected to last no more than five trading days as the company finalizes the share issuance plan, it said.

The takeover of Combi-Blocks, which supplies a range of combinatorial building blocks, organics and fine chemicals to companies around the world, will create synergy with Bide’s existing business, Bide said. It will help boost the firm’s core competitiveness, increase its market share, improve its business positioning and give new momentum to its overseas expansion.

The demand for drug molecular building blocks, which are the core raw materials used in innovative chemical drug research and development that serve as key active molecular structure parts, is rising thanks to increased investment in new drug R&D and the widespread use of computer-aided drug design and high-throughput screening technologies, Bide said.

Combi-Blocks commands a large share of the European and North American markets and boric acid is one its main products, said Bide, which supplies drug molecular building blocks and scientific reagents to many new drug R&D firms.

Bide can produce more than 400,000 different molecular building blocks with novel structures and diverse functions and has more than 110,000 items in stock, according to its latest semi-annual report.

Editor: Kim Taylor