Business Roundup

Sematech, a semiconductor technology consortium, is joining with the SUNY College of Nanoscale Science & Engineering to create a chemical mechanical planarization center in Albany, N.Y. The center aims to adapt the semiconductor wafer-polishing technique to the most advanced computer chip technologies.

Hydro-Québec, a Canadian public electric utility, has signed an agreement with the French Regional Council of Aquitaine to collaborate on developing battery materials for electric transportation. The two organizations forecast “exponential growth in demand” for energy storage.

HTE, a BASF subsidiary, is furnishing Synfuels China Technology with a high-throughput catalyst testing system that will be used for researching Fischer-Tropsch synthesis. The reactor will be installed at Synfuels China’s labs in Beijing.

KiOR, a renewables firm working to scale up a waste-to-fuels plant in Columbus, Miss., has been given 120 days to resume payments on a $69.4 million no-interest loan from the state of Mississippi. KiOR has agreed to pay the state $250,000 for the forbearance in addition to its loan payment.

Biotie has received a $2 million grant from the Michael J. Fox Foundation to investigate SYN120, a small molecule, in Parkinson’s disease patients with dementia. The grant will fund an 80-patient Phase IIa trial conducted by the Parkinson Study Group at 10 U.S. sites.

AAIPharma and Cambridge Major Laboratories will get a new CEO on Aug. 1: Stephan Kutzer, a former Lonza executive. AAIPharma, a manufacturer of finished-dosage drugs, acquired CML, a drug chemicals manufacturer, last year. Kutzer will replace Susan Nestegard, a board member who was serving as interim CEO.

DIC will spend $13 million to build a polyphenylene sulfide compounding facility in Zhangjiagang, China. The 6,000-metric-ton-per-year plant is scheduled to open at the end of 2015. The Japanese firm hopes the plant will help increase its share of the Chinese PPS market from 20% to 35%.

Cipla, an Indian generic drug manufacturer, plans to invest more than $170 million in the U.K. in coming years. The investment will help the company launch a range of respiratory, oncology, and antiretroviral drugs, as well as fund clinical trials and R&D activities.

Xellia Pharmaceuticals has bought a plant that manufactures freeze-dried vials of injectable drugs from Fresenius Kabi. The Raleigh, N.C., site will be the Danish firm’s first in the U.S. and comes with an agreement to supply products to Fresenius.