CRO

BioClinica buys into cost management with its latest deal

John Hubbard

Acquisitive CRO BioClinica bought a firm that specializes in handling the financial side of clinical trials, picking up technology that automates how sponsors and contractors pay for studies.

The Princeton, NJ, company paid an undisclosed sum for Clinverse, a North Carolina-headquartered outfit that markets a software called Clinpay to CROs and drug developers, touting the service as a way to easily pay trial sites, vendors and patients in clinical trials. The software automates what is often a manual and error-prone process, according to Clinverse, and the company said it handles exchange rates in more than 200 countries while trafficking in about 140 currencies.

With the acquisition, the company is folding into BioClinica's growing eClinical operation, and Clinverse CEO Jay Trepanier is joining the CRO to manage the technology.

"Clinverse developed one of the first automated solutions to alleviate companies of this burden," BioClinica CEO John Hubbard said in a statement. "The company is making a significant impact in reducing costly errors, improving satisfaction and increasing operational efficiencies to mitigate this major pain point in drug development."

The buyout is BioClinica's 5th in about 18 months, coming on the heels of the CRO's September deal for Synowledge, a Miami-headquartered outfit that helps biopharma companies analyze and report adverse drug events in clinical trials.

Months before, BioClinica purchased MediciGroup, a patient recruitment and retention outfit that uses technology to keep subjects engaged in trials and minimize dropouts. And in 2014, the company acquired Blueprint Clinical for its cloud-based tool for tracking and scoring clinical trial sites, and then merged with CCBR-Synarc in a deal that stretched BioClinica's focus to include medical imaging and specialty services for clinical trials.

- read the statement