SAFC Pharma plans $12m capacity expansion

20 June 2008 04:49  [Source: ICIS news]

SAN DIEGO (ICIS news)--SAFC Pharma will serve rising demand in the vaccines market with its $12m facility expansion in Carlsbad, California in the USA, which is expected to come on stream in the third quarter of 2009, the company said late on Thursday.

"The new additions to the facility will allow us to do launch-scale commercial manufacturing, and it more than doubles our current capacity," David Backer, director, business development and marketing for SAFC Pharma said at the 2008 Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) International Convention in San Diego, USA.

"The expanded capacity will be applied more for the commercial market than the clinical market," he added.

SAFC had announced the investment in January. The expansion includes 8,000 sq ft of manufacturing space and allows for 100-litre batches in stirred-tank bioreactors and 1,000-liter batches in disposable bioreactors.

Growing global interest in vaccines is driving new demand for these biologics. Newer and more efficient biotechnology-based manufacturing processes such as mammalian cell culture have boosted the market to levels not seen before.

"There is a re-awakening of interest in vaccines, charged by increasing incidents of pandemic diseases in third world populations and an increasing awareness of bioterrorism. What was once a mature market with low margins is now seeing revitalised growth," said Archie Cullen, vice president, global commercial & technical operations, SAFC Biosciences.

From a manufacturing standpoint, vaccine manufacturers are looking for rapid, reliable, and safe supply chains.

"There is a Renaissance in the vaccines market, and we now have a mature and well known mammalian cell culture line that gives us rapid scale-up and the ability to build capacity quickly and flexibly," said Backer.

Both the SAFC Biosciences and SAFC Pharma groups are growing robustly at around a 20% rate per annum due to the new market demand, and the vaccines business is growing even higher, said the company.

By: Feliza Mirasol
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