Bayer wields the axe at Emeryville plant
pharmafile | May 31, 2011 | News story | Manufacturing and Production | Bayer, Emeryville, MS
Bayer Healthcare says it will cut 540 jobs at a production facility in Emeryville, California, next year after shifting production of multiple sclerosis drug Betaseron from there to an outsourcing partner in Germany.
The decision marks the end of Bayer’s in-house production of Betaseron (interferon beta-1b), which will not be made exclusively by the company’s contract manufacturing partner Boehringer Ingelheim.
Betaseron has been a major earner at Bayer for years, adding $1.6 billion to the company’s coffers in 2010, and is still managing to post healthy growth despite an increasingly competitive environment within the MS market.
That competitiveness has made it increasingly important to reduce the cost of goods, and outsourcing production to Boehringer Ingelheim, which already makes supplies of Betaseron for international markets, is one way to achieve that objective.
The decision will have a major impact on the Emeryville plant, because of the workload at the site is dedicated to the fermentation, purification, freeze-drying and aseptic fill-and-finish activities for Betaseron.
The remaining 15% of capacity is currently given over to contract manufacturing of cancer drug Proleukin (aldesleukin), meningitis C vaccine Menjugate and platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF) for Novartis, according to Bayer’s website. Production of the three Novartis products will also be shifted elsewhere.
Bayer said employees will continue in employment at Emeryville in 2011, but all 540 positions will be removed by 2013. Some of the employees will be offered employment at Bayer’s nearby facility in Berkeley, which is currently undergoing a $100 million upgrade to boost capacity for Kogenate (recombinant antihemophilic factor), the company’s treatment for haemophilia A.
The closure of the Emeryville plant had been in the frame for some time, as Bayer leased the building from Novartis in 2007 in a $200 million deal and has just two years remaining on the original leasehold arrangement.
PhIl Taylor
Related Content
Evotec and Bayer announce new kidney disease study
Evotec and Bayer have announced the initiation of a phase 2 clinical study in kidney …
Third application for Orion’s prostate cancer drug submitted by partner Bayer
Finnish pharmaceutical company Orion has announced that its partner Bayer is applying for a third application …
Sanofi shares results from phase 2 trial for frexalimab in MS treatment
Sanofi has announced new phase 2 trial data for its CD40L monoclonal antibody, frexalimab, for …
