Omnia Biologics and University of Maryland Bioprocess Scale-Up Facility Cooperate in Providing Biopharmaceutical Processing And Manufacture

Business Wire, May 12, 2005

ROCKVILLE, Md. -- Biologics contract manufacturer Omnia Biologics, Inc. (Rockville, MD) and University of Maryland Bioprocess Scale-Up Facility (BSF) (College Park, MD) today announced an agreement to cooperate in providing services for the manufacture of biopharmaceutical products. Omnia Biologics (Omnia) is a contract manufacturer focused on the development of innovative biopharmaceutical platforms and technologies.

"The opportunity to collaborate with the world's premier academic bioprocessing facility is a great asset to our customers." commented Dale VanderPutten, CEO, Omnia Biologics "The combination of the BSF scale-up fermentation and training expertise and Omnia's cGMP processes, class 100 sterile fill-finish, and BSL-3 suites provides a unique resource to biotech and academic investigators and reinforces Maryland as a leader in biotechnology." The BSF is the University of Maryland Biotech Program's modern bioprocessing laboratory dedicated to the development and scale-up of biotechnology products and processes. With more than 678 fermentations conducted since 1998 alone, the BSF has accelerated the R&D of local biotechnology leaders such as Human Genome Sciences, NIH and MedImmune, as well as growing Maryland start-ups such as Martek Biosciences and Digene Corporation.

About Omnia Biologics: (www.omniabiologics.com)

Omnia offers services in the areas of process development, GMP manufacture, and fill-finish for preclinical and Phase I clinical programs for therapeutics that do not have effective or known manufacturing protocols. These include autologous therapeutics, new gene therapeutic platforms, and stem cell technologies. The company seeks and has established relationships with both biopharmaceutical companies and academic investigators throughout the world.