Pharmaceutical

Grand River Aseptic Manufacturing (GRAM) opened a $60 million facility for injectable fill-and-finish operations in June of 2020. Tripling GRAM's existing footprint in Grand Rapids, Mich., the 61,500-sf expansion provides a Grade C cleanroom, two formulation suites, and 14,000 sf of shell space to accommodate future growth. The facility leverages leading-edge automation technologies and high-speed instrumentation to accelerate the production of parenteral therapies. The project was delivered in just 20 months by design-build contractor CRB.

Trammell Crow Company will break ground in July of 2020 on Fulton Labs in Chicago. Providing wet and dry research environments, the 16-story, 423,454-sf life science facility will offer column-free and long-span layouts as well as a dedicated innovation floor for early-stage companies. Designed for maximum flexibility and scalability, the 16-story structure will integrate advanced mechanical infrastructure to support advanced R&D enterprises, with all labs meeting VC-A vibration criteria to ensure reproducible research results.

Sanofi Pasteur is planning to create the Evolutive Vaccine Facility (EVF) in Neuville sur Saône, France. Representing an investment of €490 million over a five-year period, the structure will house a central unit containing several fully digital production modules, enabling the manufacture of four vaccines simultaneously. This modularity will make it possible to prioritize the delivery of a specific vaccine to address crucial public health issues. The company will also invest €120 million to construct a new R&D center in Marcy-l'Etoile.

The South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute will begin construction in July of 2020 on the SAHMRI 2 building in Adelaide. Designed by Woods Bagot, the AUD$500 million project will accelerate the delivery of leading-edge clinical care as well as accommodating growing research programs in health analytics, artificial intelligence, and machine learning. Standing 12 stories above grade with three underground levels, the facility will house the Australian Bragg Centre for Proton Therapy & Research and the SAiGEN Cancer Institute.

Amid sobering reports of job losses in commercial real estate, coupled with months-long construction shutdowns in major markets like Boston and New York, the life sciences sector is poised to experience a less dramatic disruption, and possibly emerge from the pandemic even stronger than it was before. “COVID is a healthcare crisis, so it needs a healthcare solution, and that life sciences and biophparma solution has to be constructed,” says Kevin Chronley, vice president of A/Z Corp. and immediate past president of the Boston Area Chapter of International Society for Pharmaceutical Engineering (ISPE). Chronley predicts that construction will run the gamut from medical device manufacturing and biopharma laboratories to education and training facilities.

Ryvu Therapeutics completed construction in June of 2020 on the R&D Center for Innovative Drugs in Krakow, Poland. Accommodating approximately 300 employees, the $20 million headquarters and research facility will enable the clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company to accelerate the development of novel small molecule therapies that address emerging targets in oncology.

Genomic Partnership Wales is planning to construct a research facility in Cardiff in the United Kingdom to accelerate the development of pharmaceutical therapies. Created by a consortium of government, academic, and medical partners, the project involves the redevelopment of an existing two-story building to provide leading-edge genetics labs, seminar rooms, treatment suites, offices, freezer rooms, and support. The facility will include CL2 biocontainment research suites to ensure compliance with the UK's HBN 15 regulations for pathology services.

Catalent is rapidly scaling up its manufacturing capacity in Bloomington to enable production of a SARS-CoV-2 vaccine candidate that is currently being by developed by Janssen Pharmaceuticals, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson. The collaboration involves joint investment from Catalent and Janssen to enable large-scale commercial manufacturing by January of 2021, with segregated cGMP production lines operating 24/7 to create approximately a billion doses.

POINT Biopharma, a clinical-stage pharmaceutical company based in Canada, is establishing its first U.S. manufacturing center in Indianapolis. The $25 million project includes the purchase and renovation of an existing 77,000-sf, food-grade structure, with additional funds to be invested in sophisticated cleanroom technologies and packaging systems. Slated for occupancy in mid-2020, the GMP facility will support the production of radioligands for POINT's innovative cancer therapies. The next-generation manufacturing center will be fully operational by 2021.

Exyte is partnering with Univercells Technologies to create modular biomanufacturing facilities to meet the increased global demand for vaccines during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Exyte’s prefabricated construction system, ExyCell, is paired with Univercells’ NevoLine biomanufacturing platform which features the scale-X™ fixed-bed bioreactor at its core.

Erlab, a leading provider of air filtration solutions, is presenting a webinar on the mitigation of chemical risks in the laboratory at 10:00 AM BST on May 29, 2020. The one-and-a-half hour session will explore strategies for treating chemical risks at the source to enhance occupant safety and promote operational efficiency.

Visit GoToWebinar to register.

The webinar is also being offered in Spanish, Polish, French, and Maghreb French on separate days:

Medicago is building a 646,000-sf vaccine manufacturing complex in Quebec City, Canada. Designed by NFOE, the facility will support the production of approximately 50 million doses of recombinant quadrivalent influenza vaccine per year. The project has a construction cost of CAD$143 million and is expected to be fully operational in 2023.

Medicago is currently developing a vaccine for SARS-CoV-2 which has successfully induced a positive antibody response in mouse models. Human clinical trials are expected to begin in summer of 2020. 

Thermo Fisher Scientific is planning to build a $180 million viral vector development and manufacturing facility in Plainville, Mass. Featuring flexible and scalable production suites, the 290,000-sf structure will leverage advanced digital technologies to enhance operational efficiencies.

Biogen completed construction in late spring of 2020 on a leading-edge biologics manufacturing center in Luterbach, Switzerland. Representing an investment of $1.5 billion, the modular and flexible facility leverages Biogen’s latest strategies for fed-batch cell culture technologies and protein purification processes. Offering two cell manufacturing lines, the 260,000-sf complex features two production buildings, each housing four 15,000-liter bioreactors. The campus also provides laboratories, offices, maintenance buildings, and a warehouse.

Global pharmaceutical firm XBiotech is planning to construct a 30,000-sf R&D laboratory in Austin, Texas. The facility will accelerate the creation of innovative treatments for infectious diseases. The project will be sited on the company's 48-acre headquarters campus, which includes a 33,000-sf research and manufacturing center that is also undergoing expansion to accommodate greater output, a larger workforce, increased inventory, and around-the-clock production operations.