The expansion allows EMD Millipore’s customers in North America to access the same services European customers also receive at the company’s GMP biodevelopment center in Martillac, France.
Simon Boa, a director of business development and Marketing at EMD, told BioPharma-Reporter.com, “We've found a significant market demand in this area, which appears to be relatively underdeveloped in the sector. We find that companies traditionally focus their resources on increasing titer at the clone generation stage, or optimising yield at the purification stage, however, we find that some of the biggest gains can be made at media / feed selection. We are also able to confirm the scalability of the upstream conditions in our scale-down 3L CellReady bioreactors.”
Upon completion of upstream services, customers can elect to have an EMD team provide GMP drug substances, or transfer the new process and associated equipment to any facility.
“One of our biggest sectors is the North American market, where our clients have traditionally worked with us in our GMP facility near Bordeaux, France,” Boa continued. “This is where we developed the protocols and assessed thousands of data points to help us narrow our search for the best combinations. As an increasing number of our clients are based in the US, it made sense to increase our capacity to meet that demand in one of our existing US facilities.”
And the expansion may also expand in scope in the coming years.
“We are already examining expanding our services further in [Massachusetts] and indeed into Asia, so hope to have further announcements later this year,” Boa said.
“Some of the largest gains in process productivity, consistency, scalability and efficiency can be achieved during the clone to media and feed steps,” said Oliver Klaeffling, Head of Integrated Pharm Solutions. “It is essential to identify the optimal upstream process at an early stage as once in the clinic, these parameters often prove difficult to alter from a regulatory and economic standpoint. Our team works with clients to review their upstream strategies and identify opportunities for improvement while maintaining the desired quality characteristics.”