Lonza To Acquire Sterile Mfg Site from Novartis

Lonza has entered into a binding contractual agreement for the purchase of a sterile drug-product fill–finish facility in Stein, Switzerland from Novartis. The sterile, multi-product facility currently serves as the Novartis Center of Excellence for sterile clinical (Phases I to III) drug manufacture and is current good manufacturing practice (cGMP) approved.

The new facility in Stein will enable Lonza Pharma and Biotech to build on its existing parenteral drug-product development and testing capabilities. It will be the first sterile drug-product fill–finish facility in Lonza’s network, according to Lonza.

Following closing, Lonza says it will produce drug products at the facility for Novartis as well as provide capacity for additional customers. 

The facility includes classified cleanroom areas for cGMP manufacture as well as office, lab space, utilities, and storage. It will continue to perform sterile manufacturing, including liquid and lyophilized dosage forms for up to 200-liter bulk volumes for clinical supply and commercial launch. Lonza says it will continue to employ the team at the facility.

The closing is expected to take place within the next coming months, according to Lonza.

Lonza entered the drug-product development services sector at the end of 2016 and has ongoing expansions at its sites in Basel and Visp, Switzerland. From 2020, the company plans to expand development and testing labs into a larger building in Basel and expects its fill–finish facility in Visp to be operationally on track from mid-2021.

Source: Lonza

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