Avecia plans further early-phase facilities expansion

Avecia's new early-phase pharmaceuticals manufacturing facility at Huddersfield in the UK is to be expanded next year with the addition of a new early-phase pilot plant. The 12,000 sq ft facility, which was opened in June this year, was designed to allow future expansion. The company is planning to install two reactor pairs in the pilot plant, together with an additional kilo-scale manufacturing suite, to complement the existing five-stream early-phase facility.

'Strong demand for our new early-phase pharmaceutical capabilities reflects current emphasis on early phase as a major growth sector in healthcare manufacturing,' said Dr Peter Jackson, Avecia vice president, pharmaceutical products. 'Customers want faster lead times in drug development and production, and it's at early phase that the right mix of technologies and capabilities can add the most value in a production partnership.'

Since 2000 Avecia has invested more than US$60m (€58.9m) in early phase development facilities, including a new 10,000 sq ft r&d suite and a 5,000 sq ft extension to the QC lab at its Canadian pharmaceutical development business, Torcan Chemical, based in Ontario. Torcan is also introducing a new facility for the small-scale (up to 500g) cGMP manufacture of late phase actives.

In addition, Avecia is expanding its capabilities in high potency substances, with the opening this month of a new £1.5m (€1.47m) cytotoxics suite at Grangemouth in Scotland. This is a first stage development, the company says, and a further expansion in capacity is planned for 2003. Anti-cancer drugs, using high potency cytotoxics, are one of the fastest growing sectors in pharmaceutical manufacturing.