OCI President Lee Woo-hyun (Photos: OCI)

OCI, a Korean photovoltaic power material maker, is venturing into the global anti-cancer market. The move may be construed as part of OCI President Lee Woo-hyun’s “100 year plan” by diversifying its business portfolio to bio, in addition to the conventional photovoltaic power and chemical sectors.

OCI has signed a contract to take over a 5 billion won stake in SN BioScience, a Korean bio startup with a pancreatic cancer treatment candidate and a new drug delivery technology.

Under the deal, OCI has become the biggest shareholder, with a 29.3 percent stake in SN BioScience. The agreement calls for guaranteeing OCI’s rights to jointly develop SN BioScience’s pipelines and preferentially consider new pipelines.

The contract is OCI’s first investment since last July when the company inaugurated the Bio Business headquarters.
OCI’s investment was determined based on SN Bioscience’s pancreatic cancer treatment candidate “SNB-101” and the “Double Cpre-Shell Nano Micelle” platform technology. The two are the “world-firsts” developed by the startup.

SNB-101 is a new concept drug that upgrades the conventional chemotherapeutic toxicity with limited use scope.

The candidate drug has passed the scale-up stage for mass production, a big hurdle for conventional nano anticancer drugs, and it has succeeded in test production at a plant certified by the European Union’s drug authority on good manufacturing practices (GMP) standards. The company is now going to submit an application for phase 1 clinical trial with the Korean Ministry of Food and Drug Safety and U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

The Double Cpre-Shell Nano Micelle is a kind of a technology designed to change poorly soluble medicine into soluble ones to improve efficacy. OCI Senior Executive Vice President Choi Soo-jin in charge of bio business said OCI plans to expand innovative platforms and anti-cancer pipelines in connection with other future investments.

OCI’s Mainstay Business to Produce Polysilicon

OCI has developed key chemical materials that are essential for industrial development, such as inorganic chemistry, petro & coal chemistry and fine chemistry since 1959. With cutting-edge technology and know-how, OCI is expanding its business into green energy including polysilicon and solar power generation.

OCI is now venturing into the bio business. The move is designed to diversify its business portfolio to survive rapidly changing market conditions.

Last May, OCI established B&O Bio, a joint-venture with Bukwang Pharm. OCI expects nano technologies the company has accumulated in the chemical business to shine in the bio business segment.

OCI Power’s Acquisition of KACO new energy Gmbh in Korea

OCI Power has completed its acquisition of the technology and manufacturing for central inverters that KACO new energy Gmbh established in Korea.
With the acquisition, OCI has expanded its business portfolio to manufacturing technology such as inverter and power conditioning system on top of the conventional photovoltaic power generation business solutions.