Millipore has opened a US$50m Bioprocess r&d centre in Bedford, Massachusetts, aimed to enable the company to leverage the latest technologies, and meet the growing demands of the global biopharmaceutical market and the life sciences industry.
'Our new Bioprocess r&d Centre is a demonstration of our commitment to Massachusetts and our continuing investment in technologies and facilities that will help us to deliver innovative, quality products to our customers,' said Martin Madaus, chairman and ceo of Millipore.
More than 200 employees, customers, partners and other guests joined the company recently to mark the milestone. 'For the past 20 years, Millipore and Biogen Idec have been working together to deliver important biologic therapies to the market,' said Michael Kowolenko, senior vp of pharmaceutical operations and technology at Biogen Idec.
With more than 65 percent of Millipore's revenues coming from outside the US, the research centre will support the needs of the company's global customers, who are involved in life science research and the pro-duction of biopharmaceutical drugs. The Bioprocess division is dedicated to helping pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies to optimise their manufacturing productivity, ensure the quality of drugs, and scale up the production of difficult-to-manufacture biologics.
In the new centre, Millipore is able to develop full-scale applications performance data and processes that simulate commercial conditions, ultimately resulting in increased speed and quality of biopharmaceutical production for their customers, the company says.
The state-of-the-art 110,000ft2 building contains 47,000ft2 of lab space, and consolidates multiple functions, fostering a collaborative approach for the up to 500 professionals who will work there.