Shire’s $1 billion plasma fractionation plant in Georgia has gone through three owners already since it was envisioned and will soon have a fourth. But after six years, it is now officially open.
The company held a kickoff ceremony at the plant in Covington on Thursday, according to The Covington News. In an email, the company confirmed that the plant currently has about 900 employees and is expected to have about 1,500 when it is fully operational.
The 1 million-square-foot facility was announced in 2012 when Baxalta was still the drug unit of Baxter International. Baxter spun the drug unit off into Baxalta in 2014, and Shire bought Baxalta in a $32 billion deal in 2016 in a move to broaden its offerings. The plant is soon expected to have a fourth owner after Japan’s Takeda in May made a $62 billion deal to buy Dublin-based Shire.
Through all of that, patients have been “the ultimate inspiration for everything,” Carlos Soto, Shire’s vice president of manufacturing operations, said at the opening, the newspaper reported.
The company will make immunoglobulin products there to help patients with primary immune deficiency disorders. The company last year said it has filed its first submission to the FDA for the plant, seeking the transfer of production of Gammagard Liquid, a replacement therapy for primary humoral immunodeficiency. Shire in June won FDA approval for the product.
Shire expects to make a second submission to the FDA this year for development of its albumin therapy at the Covington facility. Shire’s albumin therapy is primarily used as plasma-volume replacement therapy in immune disorders, trauma and other critical conditions, the company said.
By Eric Palmer
Source: Fierce Pharma
Big Pharma has long seen the potential for AI and machine learning to accelerate drug development. But Novo Nordisk is going a step further by channeling $200 million toward the creation of a computer that will outrun anything in existence.
Current methods for diagnosing Alzheimer’s disease rely on a complex combination of self- and caregiver-reported symptoms, a physical examination and either a PET scan or a spinal tap to look for evidence of amyloid plaque build-ups in the brain. But a new artificial intelligence-based method may make the diagnostic process a much more objective one.
There is lots of talk about diversity and inclusion in business, including in pharma and medtech. A new report by the Open Political Economy Network (OPEN), a think tank focusing on migration and diversity, released its “Minority Businesses Matter: Europe” report highlighting the successes and challenges of ethnic minority-owned businesses in Europe.
