Xiangxue Pharmaceutical (XPH) has selected GE Healthcare’s FlexFactory – a semi-automated manufacturing platform – to advance clinical and commercial production of cell therapies.
The project marks the first FlexFactory installation for the manufacture of cell immunotherapy drugs based on high-affinity and high-specificity T cell receptors.
A GE spokesperson told us the companies have signed the agreement and are discussing next steps for installation.
“The FlexFactory platform is expected to be operational in March 2019," the spokesperson said.
‘Rapid speed’ China
According to GE’s general manager of cell and gene therapy Ger Brophy, a combination of innovation, regulation, and manufacturing is taking place at a “rapid speed” in China.
“XPH is an example of a company in China that is already preparing for future commercialization by collaborating with GE Healthcare to scale up their manufacturing processes,” he told us.
The XPH deal follows Shanghai-based Cellular Biomedicine Group’s (CBMG) adoption of the FlexFactory platform – the first ever for the application of cell therapies – announced in January this year.
Later that month, GE continued to grow its FlexFactory presence in China, with the announcement that Clover Biopharmaceuticals would adopt the platform at its facility in Zhejiang, to make a biosimilar version of Amgen’s Enbrel.