Charlottesville life sciences company Vion Biosciences has acquired Salt Lake City’s Echelon Biosciences, a supplier of medicine-making materials, to support its move into drug manufacturing.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Vion is a portfolio company of Iron Path Capital, a private equity firm that has dual headquarters in Charlottesville and Nashville, Tennessee.
Echelon is a notable supplier of lipid-based excipients, which are used in drug-delivery systems. Its lipid-based excipients are considered crucial in the development of mRNA therapies such as vaccines.
Vion said the deal solidifies its strengths in drug discovery in the pre-clinical space and enables it to move into drug manufacturing “while enhancing customer access to specialized products and technologies” through an expansion of its product portfolio.
“The acquisition of Echelon Biosciences allows us to more effectively serve our customers who are focused on the delivery of a variety of mRNA and other gene-based biotherapeutics,” Vion CEO Mark Thornton said in a statement. “Echelon’s long history as a market leader in ionizable and other critical lipids necessary to various stages of drug development pairs nicely with Vion’s growth goals to expand its portfolio offering in the biopharma, diagnostic and clinical research segments.”
Echelon will operate as a subsidiary of Vion, continuing to serve its existing customers while receiving resources and infrastructure from Vion. The technical and commercial leadership within Echelon will remain in place, the companies said, and Vion plans to add to Echelon’s leadership and resources through the end of the year and into 2025.
The deal comes about a year after Iron Path rolled up Avon, New York’s Aldon Corp., a laboratory chemicals company, into Vion.
Iron Path recently closed its first institutional fund, totaling $273 million.
