AcuraBio winds up CDMO business a year after PE takeover

In September 2022, private equity firm Ampersand Capital Partners acquired LuinaBio. A year on, the renamed CDMO AcuraBio has folded.

According to a notice published on the Australian Securities & Investments Commission (ASIC), contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO) AcuraBio was put into liquidation on 17 August and the company is being “wound up voluntarily.”

The news comes less than a year after the microbial manufacturer – then known as LuinaBio – was acquired by biotech investor Glenn Haifer and private equity (PE) firm Ampersand Capital Partners.

No financial details of the deal were divulged, but Haifer and Ampersand said at the time their plan involved expanding Acura’s production facility capacity, located near Brisbane, Australia.

BioProcess Insider reached out to both the company and PE firm Ampersand Capital for further details, but neither replied.

Acura’s website is now defunct, but an internet archive shows the facility had the capabilities to produce recombinant proteins and vaccines, along with live therapeutic products for the biotech, pharmaceutical, and veterinary industries. The site offered both yeast/microbial fermentation and anaerobic fermentation, as well as lyophilization, QC/QA services, and process development services.

AcuraBio made the news earlier this year by announcing the addition of plasmid DNA (pDNA) services to its capabilities through the incorporation of Cytiva’s two-step purification system, AKTA readyflux. However, it must be assumed plasmid DNA – like its other services – is no longer available.