Anika Acquires Fidia Advanced Biopolymers

Anika Therapeutics (Anika) has acquired Fidia Advanced Biopolymers, (FAB), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Fidia Farmaceutici. Anika will develop its own direct US sales capability to capture higher margins from the domestic sales of Monovisc, its single-injection osteoarthritis treatment. Direct commercialisation activities will also include the portfolio of FAB orthopedic products once approvals are achieved in the US.

As per the terms of the sale and purchase agreement, Anika has purchased FAB in exchange for $17.1m in cash and 1,981,192 shares of its common stock. The company anticipates that the acquisition will be accretive to earnings in the second year of combined operations.

Charles Sherwood, president and CEO of Anika, said: “FAB provides Anika with an exciting new growth platform and advances our vision to offer therapeutic products that go beyond pain relief to protect and restore damaged tissue. FAB’s complementary regenerative technology allows us to expand Anika’s commercial product portfolio and development pipeline with joint health and other therapeutic products. FAB also has a strong research ability that complements Anika’s excellent development and manufacturing resources.

“FAB’s innovative orthopedic product portfolio will provide us with a critical mass of products to sell into the US market along with Monovisc upon its approval. We filed the final module of our Monovisc PMA containing the clinical data on December 24th, and we expect to receive FDA approval in the second half of 2010. Internationally, we are planning to leverage FAB’s distributor partners in Europe and Asia to enhance sales of Monovisc and Anika’s other products in new and existing international markets.”