Biologic Drugs

Sartorius Stedim Biotech will supply equipment for Penn State’s new Fermentation Facility in the university’s Center of Excellence in Industrial Biotechnology.

The new facility, to be built in Toronto, Canada, will significantly increase capacity for pediatric and booster vaccines.

The biopharmaceutical firm has chosen Rhode Island as the site of its next-generation biomanufacturing plant, which will offer flexibility, speed, and efficiency.

The new 300,000-square-foot facility is considered the largest dedicated cell and gene therapy manufacturing facility with fully integrated services.

Roche has acquired a program to develop regenerative therapies for multiple sclerosis.

Under this global collaboration, the companies will develop encapsulated cell therapies for treating Type 1 diabetes.

Celltrion received complete response letters from FDA for its rituximab and trastuzumab biosimilars.

Boehringer Ingelheim and OSE Immunotherapeutics have entered a global immuno-oncology partnership to develop a checkpoint inhibitor for treating advanced solid tumors.

The companies have created Syna Therapeutics, a joint venture that will develop biosimilars and new molecules.

The European approval marks the first approval for a biosimilar in that region resulting from the companies’ joint portfolio.

Fujifilm acquires cell culture media companies Irvine Scientific Sales Company and IS Japan.

The agency has accepted AstraZeneca’s biologics license application for an investigational leukemia drug candidate and granted it priority review.

Pfizer transfers CAR-T assets to Allogene Therapeutics under a new alliance to further develop immuno-oncology therapeutics.

Access to multiple analytical techniques is essential for fully characterizing complex protein formulations.

The high viscosity of highly concentrated monoclonal antibody formulations not only presents processing and storage difficulties, but also formulation and delivery challenges.

Researchers at MIT have discovered a new set of compounds that do not elicit a foreign body response when implanted. These biomaterials permit the development of a new category of treatment with the ability to deliver therapeutics either at a constant rate or under programmable conditions by using implantable cells as protein factories.

The companies will co-develop and co-promote a CAR T cell therapy in the United States.

Novartis’ Sandoz is seeking approval of its biosimilar referencing Johnson & Johnson’s Remicade (infliximab) for all of Remicade’s indications across gastroenterology, rheumatology, and dermatology.

EMA has recommended approval of the biosimilar for the same indications as Roche’s Herceptin (trastuzumab).

Major countries will be ranked based on the potential for biopharma market growth, innovation, and competitiveness.

Hitachi will manufacture regenerative medicines developed by Daiichi Sankyo and SanBio Group.

The agreement gives IncoCell Tianjin, a wholly-owned subsidiary of China-based Boyalife Group, access to Cesca’s celluar processing contract development and manufacturing services.

The collaboration between the two companies aims to finish all necessary work needed to file for a first-in-human study by early 2019.

The company plans to install 4000-L disposable bioreactors from ABEC at its new commercial manufacturing facility in Wuxi city, China.

Sartorius Stedim Biotech has launched a new automated parallel bioreactor system for perfusion culture.

GlobalData reports the need to shift away from egg-based manufacturing of vaccines in light of influenza-related deaths.

Under this agreement, the companies will develop in parallel an antibody drug candidate and cell lines for other potential candidates.

The pharma major will spin out six molecules in early stage inflammation and autoimmune programs into a new company called Viela Bio.

The study suggests that circumventing evolution in cell factories can enable the commercialization of new biobased chemicals to large-scale.

Unlike current approaches where bioconjugation is typically done following the manufacture of the monoclonal antibody and the cytotoxic drug, the new method begins with the antibody supernatants and eliminates the need for extensive chromatographic purification.