Rentschler doubles manufacturing capacity to address growing demand for biopharmaceuticals

Published: 16-Sep-2016

New facility offers innovative Twin system with two 3,000-litre bioreactors and associated downstream processing equipment in the company's second significant expansion in a year


Rentschler Biotechnologie, a leading contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO) for biopharmaceuticals, has opened a new facility at its site in Laupheim.

The expansion includes an innovative Twin system, which consists of two 3,000-litre stainless steel bioreactors. It is designed to run the two bioreactors in parallel or staggered, with one shared downstream processing unit, thus providing higher throughput while reducing costs. This system integrates well into the existing 3,000-litre facility and more than doubles Rentschler's manufacturing capacity for cell culture-derived proteins.

This is the second increase in Rentschler's manufacturing capacity in a year; a new 2,000L single-use bioreactor was put into operation in 2015.

With the growing demand for biopharmaceuticals and increased industry manufacturing outsourcing, Rentschler has more than doubled its manufacturing capacity, investing a total of €24m. The Twin system was completed three months ahead of schedule. Proteins for the clinical development of drug candidates, as well as already approved drugs, will be produced.

'The growing demand for biopharmaceuticals and the rising number of drug candidates in clinical development was recognised by Rentschler early on. For this reason, the company has been strategically expanding its manufacturing capacity, most recently in 2015,' said Dr Frank Mathias, Chief Executive Officer of Rentschler Biotechnologie. 'Today, only one year later, we have completed another major step in this expansion, achieving an important milestone in the longstanding track record of Rentschler.

'An increase in sales of more than 30% in the past two years has enabled us to make this significant investment. We have already received manufacturing orders for the new facility, extending into 2018. Increasingly, our growth is being driven by international business, with more and more orders coming from abroad, particularly the United States.'

Rentschler is also planning to increase the size of its workforce significantly by creating approximately 200 new jobs, including process engineers and laboratory technicians in bioprocess development and manufacturing as well as GMP (Good Manufacturing Practices) experts.

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