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Clinical Professionals expands its European Clinical Development coverage with the opening of its dedicated International Office in Central London.

Troubled e-clinical specialist Datatrak International (Cleveland, Ohio) could be up for sale shortly, depending on the outcome of a review of strategic options now under way.

In the latest of five acquisitions, Worldwide Clinical Trials (Beverley Hills, California) has completed the purchase of Serbian CRO MediQuest (Belgrade).

Canadian CRO Algorithme Pharma (Laval, Quebec) has acquired a US clinical research centre from Bioanalytical Systems (BASi - West Lafayette, Indiana) for US$850,000 in cash.

US e-clinical specialist Datatrak International (Cleveland, Ohio) has decided to close its office in Bonn, Germany. Global help-desk services previously carried out by the office will now be provided from the company’s Cleveland headquarters.

Veeda Oncology (Columbus, Ohio) has acquired French cancer trials specialist Biologie et Industrie for an undisclosed sum.

Quintiles Transnational (Research Triangle Park, North Carolina) has signed an agreement to acquire Eidetics (Boston, Massachusetts), a privately held healthcare market research and consulting firm. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Pharmaceutical services company i3 (Basking Ridge, New Jersey) has acquired Russian CRO Lege Artis (Moscow). Financial terms were not disclosed.

Mixed results for Novartis’s first-in-class direct renin inhibitor, Rasilez (aliskiren), have been reported from the ALLAY study at the American College of Cardiology meeting in Chicago, US.

Quintiles Transnational (North Carolina) has signed an agreement with Medca Japan to provide central laboratory services in Japan. Quintiles will have its own staff at the Medca Japan laboratory in Saitama, a city in the Greater Tokyo area

QPS (Newark, Delaware) has acquired early-phase specialist Bio-Kinetic Clinical Applications (Springfield, Missouri). Bio-Kinetic has a 240-bed Phase I facility - one of the largest in the US owned by an independent CRO.

US biotechnology company GeoVax Labs’ (Atlanta, Georgia) HIV/AIDS vaccine is expected to enter Phase IIa human trials in mid-2008.

Clinical technology specialist ClinPhone (Nottingham, UK) has rejected a preliminary approach from Parexel International regarding a possible offer for the company.

Polish CRO KCR (Warsaw) has acquired its Czech counterpart DUX Consulting (Prague). The value of the transaction was not disclosed.

Quintiles Transnational (Research Triangle Park, North Carolina) has completed a new investor partnership in which CEO Dennis Gillings and private investment firms Bain Capital and TPG Capital have become the lead investors.

GlaxoSmithKline has decided not to exercise its option to license Exelixis’s (San Francisco, California) kidney disease drug XL784 for further development and commercialisation.

Quintiles Transnational (Research Triangle Park, North Carolina) is to expand its global central laboratories and clinical development service (CDS) units in Beijing, China.

The US Food and Drug Administration has lifted its clinical hold on Vion Pharmaceuticals’ Phase III trial of its lead anti-cancer agent, Cloretazine (VNP40101M), in combination with Ara-C (cytarabine) in relapsed acute myelogenous leukaemia (AML).

US CRO Clinsys Clinical Research (Bedminster, New Jersey) and its French counterpart ITEC Services (Cenon, Bordeaux) have entered into a strategic alliance agreement.

PPD (Wilmington, North Carolina) has appointed Dr Philip Mathew as director of strategic development, to lead its Phase II-IV operations and expansion in India.

Seattle Genetics (Bothell, Washington) has begun a Phase IIb clinical trial of its monoclonal antibody SGN-40 as an adjunct to second-line therapy for relapsed or refractory diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL).

eResearchTechnology (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) is to acquire Covance’s (Princeton, New Jersey) centralised electrocardiographic business for up to $49.2 million.

Merck KGaA’s Merck Serono division and Newron Pharmaceuticals (Milan, Italy) have launched a Phase III trial of safinamide as an add-on to dopamine agonist therapy in early Parkinson’s disease.

US cancer biotechnology company AVEO Pharmaceuticals (Cambridge, Massachusetts) has signed a collaborative agreement with Eli Lilly to use AVEO's Human Response Platform in a pilot project.

Covance (Princeton, New Jersey) has purchased from Eli Lilly a partially constructed insulin manufacturing facility on a 47-acre site in Prince William County's technology park (Virginia, US).

Indian CRO Manipal AcuNova (Bangalore) and its German counterpart ECRON (Frankfurt) have signed a definitive merger agreement. The combined company, ECRON AcuNova, will have 265 employees

Averion International has acquired Swiss CRO Hesperion from its parent company, Cerep, for €25 million ($36.2 million).

Targeted Genetics (Boston, Massachusetts) says that final tests support earlier indications that a patient death during a trial of its injectable anti-arthritis drug, tgAAC94, was not caused by the drug.

India is expected to host 30% of the world's contract research within the next 10-15 years, driven by the attractions of low cost and high quality standards, says the India Brand Equity Foundation, IBEF.

AstraZeneca’s Osaka-based Japanese subsidiary has reached a master clinical study agreement with Keio University School of Medicine (Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo).

Accenture and Bristol-Myers Squibb have formed a pharmacovigilance centre in Chennai, India. It is the first joint centre for adverse event report processing, medical review and reporting.

Pharmaceutical outsourcing, especially clinical research, is growing strongly - by more than 15% last year. With that growth comes a demand for more and more staff to handle the increasing volume of trials reports Shirley Scott, Operations Manager.

China and India have joined the World Health Organisation’s clinical trial registry platform. Both countries have a rapidly expanding clinical trial research sector