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The expanded and modernized biopharmaceutical production plant at Boehringer Ingelheim’s Research & Development and Biotechnology site in Biberach/Riss was inaugurated today
BIBERACH, Germany, | November 29, 2007 | The expanded and modernized biopharmaceutical production plant at Boehringer Ingelheim’s Research & Development and Biotechnology site in Biberach/Riss (Germany) was inaugurated today. Since 2005, when the expansion and modernization of the plant was started, a total of EUR 80 million has been invested into the project. Together with the second production facility for active pharmaceutical ingredients derived from mammalian cell culture in Biberach (investment of EUR 255 million), which started operations in 2004, the company owns state-of-the-art technology to further expand its position as one of the world’s leading manufacturers of biopharmaceuticals.
"The expansion of the biopharmaceutical production plant became necessary since this plant, which had already started operations in 1986 as the first large-scale plant of its kind in Europe, approached its capacity limits", explained Dr. Uwe Bücheler, Senior Vice President Biopharmaceuticals. This is due to the fact that – based on the success in developing biopharmaceutical processes – fermentation yields could be increased by a factor of 100 – from the range of milligrams to grams – within only a few years. As a result, capacity increases became mainly necessary in downstream processing (purification of protein active substances). The plant shut down due to the expansion was also used to completely modernize the facility after more than 20 years of manufacturing at very high capacity usage.
"We have thus achieved a clear competitive advantage – which not only benefits our own company but also our customers – in order to ultimately ensure our company’s goal that patients around the world will continue to receive innovative medications", emphasized Dr. Hans-Jürgen Leuchs, Head of Corporate Board Division Operations at Boehringer Ingelheim. "Our expertise and more than two decades of experience in biotechnical manufacturing form a strong basis."
From the beginning, Boehringer Ingelheim’s shareholders have fostered and supported the expansion of the biopharmaceutical business and also for the future, this technology is considered to be of great importance, emphasized Christian Boehringer, Chairman of the Shareholder’s Committee of Boehringer Ingelheim. "Biberach is one of the internationally leading high-tech sites. Above all, our employees’ expertise is highly appreciated – the list of our customers reads like a ‘who is who’ of biopharmaceutical industry."
In the two biopharmaceutical production plants in Biberach, which count among the world’s most advanced and largest ones, Boehringer Ingelheim manufactures innovative drugs, to cover the company’s own requirements as well as the demands of our collaboration partners as contract manufacturers. Dr. Leuchs emphasized that it is still worthwhile to fight for "Biotechnology made in Germany". In the past years, the number of innovative biopharmaceutical active substances (new biological entities) for indication areas with a high therapeutic value grew almost twice as fast as that of traditional pharmaceuticals.
More than 20 years ago, Boehringer Ingelheim started its success story in biotechnological development and production of modern pharmaceuticals by means of cell cultures. While in 1985, Boehringer Ingelheim’s Biotechnology site in Biberach offered jobs for approximately 150 people, there are now more than 1,500 employees. This capacity increase again considerably strengthens Boehringer Ingelheim’s leading position as the only company worldwide that provides the entire biotechnical process chain in early development and large-scale commercial manufacturing to global registration and marketing of biopharmaceuticals.
The Boehringer Ingelheim group is one of the world’s 20 leading pharmaceutical companies. Headquartered in Ingelheim, Germany, it operates globally with 137 affiliates in 47 countries and nearly 38,500 employees. Since it was founded in 1885, the family-owned company has been committed to researching, developing, manufacturing and marketing innovative products of high therapeutic value for human and veterinary medicine. In 2006, Boehringer Ingelheim posted net sales of 10.6 billion euro while spending almost one fifth of net sales in its largest business segment Prescription Medicines on research and development.
Boehringer Ingelheim is one of the leading companies for industrial customer manufacturing of Biopharmaceuticals by offering the entire production technology chain in development and production at its biopharmaceutical facilities in Biberach (Germany) and in Vienna (Austria).
The large scale manufacturing sites deliver biopharmaceutical products like therapeutic proteins, fusion proteins, protein scaffolds, monoclonal antibodies, antibody fragments and plasmid DNA. The Biberach site is specialized in highly efficient mammalian cell culture systems with yields well above industry standard in animal component free media. The Austria site offers high-expression in bacteria and yeast with exceptionally high productivities using proprietary systems. In the plasmid DNA manufacturing arena Boehringer Ingelheim in Austria has set the standard and supplies early to late-stage clinical trials with gene-therapeutics and DNA vaccines for its international clients.
SOURCE: Boehringer Ingelheim
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