Japanese pharmaceutical and biotech company Kyowa Kirin has completed the construction of a new drug substance manufacturing facility.
The facility is situated at the company's biopharmaceutical manufacturing site in Takasaki, Japan, and is designed for the manufacture of biopharmaceutical drug substances.
Using Kyowa Kirin's proprietary antibody technology and protein engineering capabilities, the GMP-compliant site will be responsible for the production of early-phase, investigational drugs — acting as a pilot facility for process development.
The facility also utilises single-use technology, reducing the risk of product cross-contamination, as well as time between batches.
Kyowa Kirin has constructed the building to allow for future expansion — enabling the introduction of continuous production, automation and digitisation in the future.
The company has also inaugurated a training facility for the biopharmaceutical manufacturing and quality control, allowing employees to practice performing the processes used in the main building.
“We're very glad that construction of the Takasaki plant has been successful, though our expansion doesn't stop there," said Toshiyuki Kurata, MBA, Managing Executive Officer, Chief Supply Chain Officer at Kyowa Kirin.
"By manufacturing drug substances in-house, we hope to further accelerate development, providing life-changing therapeutics to patients quickly," he added.
Kyowa Kirin has also begun construction on a new US-based manufacturing site in Sanford, North Carolina, which will produce next-generation biologics.
This also follows the company's acquisition of UCL Spinout, Orchard Therapeutics, which has further bolstered the company's biologic development credentials — particularly in the gene therapy niche.