Crown Bioscience Announces Merger with JSR Corporation

(San Diego, Calif., December 21, 2017) — Crown Bioscience, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Crown Bioscience International (TWSE: ticker 6554) and a global drug discovery and development services company providing translational platforms to advance oncology, inflammation, cardiovascular and metabolic disease research, announced yesterday that they will merge with and become a fully owned subsidiary of the JSR Corporation, headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. The merger produces a fully integrated suite of innovative solutions to support researchers through every stage of drug and diagnostic development – from early research through manufacturing.

The strategic merger integrates Crown Bioscience’s leading translational technology platform providing drug target validation, efficacy testing and patient response characterization with JSR’s in vitro diagnostic (IVD) solutions, GMP manufacturing capabilities and worldwide distribution networks.

“We are excited to join the JSR family of companies through this innovation-driven strategic partnership,” said Dr. Jean-Pierre Wery, Crown Bioscience’s Chief Executive Officer. “Crown Bioscience’s core competencies in preclinical and translational research combined with JSR’s global footprint, diagnostic solutions and manufacturing capabilities will provide a fully integrated solution to help biopharmaceutical companies get drugs and diagnostics to market more efficiently.”

The completion of the merger is expected to close before the end of the second quarter of 2018.

Crown Bioscience is a global drug discovery and development solutions company providing translational platforms to advance oncology, inflammation and metabolic disease research. With an extensive portfolio of relevant models and predictive tools, Crown Bioscience enables clients to deliver superior clinical candidates.