24/7 Biopharma had the opportunity to speak with Jeffrey Yordon, CEO and co-founder of Avenacy, a specialty pharmaceutical company focused on supplying critical injectable medications, at DCAT Week 2025. In this interview, Yordon discussed launching his latest company, how Avenacy aims to separate itself from competitors, and what it takes to navigate the tumultuous nature of the current biopharma business environment.

24/7 BioPharma, By Grant Playter

Launching Avenacy

Avenacy was founded in October 2023 by Yordon and long-time business partner Kam Phulwani. Notably, Avenacy is not the first, second, or even fifth company that Yordon has founded; he has a long history of founding specialty pharma companies, building them up, and selling them to outside investors. Notable companies he founded include American Pharmaceutical Partners, which Fresenius Kabi purchased for approximately $3.7 billion in 2008, and Sagent Pharmaceuticals, which Nichi-Iko Pharmaceutical acquired in a deal valued at $736 million in 2016.

“You know, I like to say maybe I was lucky the first time, the second time,” says Yordon. “You’re not lucky seven times. People would invest in me because I always did what I said I was going to do.”

Through a rigorous and optimized selection process, Avenacy is building out a portfolio of high-quality FDA approved products capable of delivering sustainable growth while providing reliability, safety, and convenience for customers. The Company has announced the launch of 20 products since inception in October 2023.

Navigating the Generic Market

According to Yordon, in many ways Avenacy is following the same model that he began implementing in his companies around the turn of the century. Because the FDA requires dedicated facilities for certain types of pharmaceuticals, it is very difficult to personally own and operate the manufacturing facilities needed to sustain a wide catalog of products.

“So I said what we’re going to do is we’re going to find partners that have pristine FDA-approved facilities and pristine development facilities, and they’re going to be our partners,” says Yordon. “They’ll develop and manufacture the products. We’ll tell them which products to develop. We’ll help them with the development. We’ll take care of all their quality. We will make the regulatory filings for them. We will handle the supply chain from to the United States, and we’ll market the products.”

While it was founded in October 2023, Yordon says that Avenacy is working with approximately 30 partners in 23 different countries, giving them access to 53 manufacturing facilities that they do not personally own. The theory behind this model is that it gives them the ability to flexibly manufacture specialty pharma products as the market demands without being over-invested in any one area.

However, in addition to this manufacturing strategy, Yordon was emphatic that differentiation was “essential” in the current generics market. Consequently, in addition to a focus on partnerships with outside manufacturers, particularly in China and India, Avenacy works to differentiate its product catalog via creative target selection and other innovations.

For example, while he couldn’t go into specifics on what the exact product was, Yordon noted that there’s an upcoming cancer product that Avenacy took on specifically because of its high manufacturing difficulty. According to Yordon, the formulation is “almost impossible” to make, requires a dedicated line, and has only two raw material sources available globally, meaning there’s significantly less appetite for it in the greater generics market. Due to their model, however, Avenacy can manufacture the product and hit the market relatively quickly after patent expiration.

“That’s a product that we will launch shortly after patent expiration,” says Yordon. “That’s a perfect example of where there’s not going to be very many competitors. The amount of money it takes to bring that to market, okay, you’re not going to simply reduce the price in half when it comes up.”

Another upcoming product Avenacy selected has a similarly difficult formulation and the capacity to blow up one’s facility, which will also make it similarly undesirable among competitors. However, Avenacy is also planning to change the dosage form from an ampule to a vial, as Yordon strongly feels that the American market prefers vials.

“This country hates ampules. Europe loves ampules,” says Yordon. “We’re going to say ‘We have the same product, but we’ll give it to you in a vial.’”

This structured market approach is based on the premise that one looks for niches, big or small, that are not being filled. In this vein, by changing this dosage form, Avenacy is offering a different product not just from other generic providers, but the original patent holder as well.

At the time of this writing, Avenacy’s catalog of approximately 20 generic products. Avenacy announced the launch of five injectable antibiotics during DCAT Week and has since launched a Propofol Injectable Emulsion as a generic alternative to Diprivan for use as a general anesthetic and sedation drug. According to Yordon, the company also plans to launch 20+ products between 2025 and 2027.

“We’ve reduced costs on very, very expensive drugs, aligning with our mission to streamline patient care” says Yordon. “We have stepped in for shortages, which we’re doing now as well. There are over 500 shortage products in the U.S. right now. On the injectable side alone, about half our products are shortage products.”

“I think I made a great decision a long time ago. I was either going to go to law school or I was going take a job as a [pharmaceutical] rep for a year to see if I liked it,” says Yordon. “That was in 1970. I liked it.”

References

1. Fresenius Kabi to acquire APP Pharmaceuticals – entry into North American I.V. generics market provides excellent growth opportunities
https://www.fresenius.com/node/4798
2. Sagent Pharmaceuticals shares soar after acquisition deal with Japan’s Nichi-Iko
https://www.cnbc.com/2016/07/11/sagent-pharmaceuticals-shares-soar-after-acquisition-deal-with-japans-nichi-iko.html?msockid=2ca77e939b6d67ba3d076b5a9ab466cd
3. Avenacy Announces Launch of Five Injectable Antibiotic Products in the U.S. Market
https://www.avenacy.com/avenacy-announces-launch-of-five-injectable-antibiotic-products-in-the-u-s-market/
4. Avenacy Announces Launch of Propofol Injectable Emulsion, USP in the U.S. Market
https://www.avenacy.com/avenacy-announces-launch-of-propofol-injectable-emulsion-usp-in-the-u-s-market/