Emergent BioSolutions, a contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO) currently focused on biologics, plans to widen the range of its offerings by adding viral vector and gene therapy services.
According to the company, this will involve a ‘molecule-to-market’ service, once it has completed the $75m (€67m) investment into its Canton, Massachusetts site.
The capital will be put towards buying a property adjacent to its existing live viral drug substance facility, with the expanded area being a ‘multi-suite operation’ holding capacity up to the 1,000L scale.
Once the work is completed, the CDMO expects to be able to offer advanced therapy drug substance manufacturing services by the beginning of 2023.
Complementing the Canton site are Emergent’s additional locations in the US, as the company offers development services out of its Gaithersburg location and drug product manufacturing from Rockville, with the latter site also being expanded and with a completion date set for the end of 2021.
Contracted against COVID-19
Alongside a growing manufacturing footprint, the company has found its services in demand during the novel coronavirus outbreak.
The US government provided the company with a $628m contract to provide CDMO services for COVID-19 programs, with Emergent set to use part of this funding towards expanding drug product fill/finish capacity.
Prior to this, Emergent had already sealed a manufacturing partnership with Johnson & Johnson to develop its lead COVID-19 vaccine candidate – as the latter company worked towards securing a supply of one billion doses for its potential vaccine.
