Lonza boosts biologics

30 April 2007 00:00  [Source: ICB Americas]

With its recent $300m expansion project at its Portsmouth, N.H., site, Lonza will boost its mammalian cell manufacturing capacity even further. The expansion follows on the heels of beginning construction in Singapore last month, where Lonza is currently building its second large-scale mammalian facility.

Lonza's Portsmouth site already holds the largest-scale mammalian cell culture facility to date. Current capacity totals 93,000 liters. The expansion will result in an additional 5,000 liters of bioreactor capacity, which is scheduled to come on stream in mid-2008.

The new facility may generate 350 additional jobs in Portsmouth, and the number of commercial and clinical biotherapeutics manufactured on site will also increase.

The expansion enhances Lonza's capability to offer tailor-made manufacturing solutions to its customers, utilizing cutting-edge fermentation technologies and new throughput-boosting downstream processing.

"The new facility in Portsmouth will further strengthen Lonza's position as the leading supplier to the life science industry," says the company.

Singapore

Meanwhile, groundbreaking in Singapore will take place on May 17. The new, 330,000 square foot facility is designed to house leading edge manufacturing technologies for biotherapeutics. In addition, the design is specifically geared toward new high titer processes in mind.

Singapore is fast growing into the next hub of life sciences manufacturing, much like Ireland has been. Singapore has aggressively set out to attract biologics manufacturing. Pharma major Schering-Plough, for example, has a facility there, with commitment to further build.

And Singapore is expected to draw more biopharmaceutical manufacturing, as the government is offering a variety of incentives such as tax breaks and training support. Other pharmaceutical companies already located there also provide a network of industry-knowledgeable people and personnel.

Lonza's activities in Singapore extend further. In addition to the facility being built, it is building another 80,000 liter manufacturing plant for production of Avastin (bevacizumab) under a deal with biotech firm Genentech. The Avastin plant will also be used for other oncology products.

Another region that has given Lonza new capacity is Porrino, Spain. Under the Genentech deal, Lonza acquired Genentech's biologic manufacturing facility at that site, which adds 40,000 liters of capacity. Lonza is focusing its strategy to concentrate on streamlining.

Priorities in 2007

Lonza's 2007 priorities revolve around an overall focus on business delivery and integration, says the company.

For its biopharmaceuticals business, it will concentrate on delivery of operational success rate and targeted yields integration of microbial biopharma and Porrino's system and the execution of Singapore and Portsmouth projects on time and on budget.

"Strong performance of biopharmaceuticals [for first quarter 2007] was due to the high utilization and success rate of all plants. A strong project pipeline supports the various expansion projects," said Stefan Borgas, Lonza's CEO, in a recent conference call.

Lonza has answered to strong demand from customers for biopharma services and its GS (glutamine synthetase) gene expression technology platform, particularly in early clinical phases, notes Borgas.

For its exclusive synthesis component, Lonza intends to keep up its operational performance in Visp, Switzerland, and Kourim, Czech Republic, as well as implement process improvements at its Braine and Riverside sites in Conshohocken, Penn. It also expects projects in China to be on time and on budget.

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