Novasep invest €30m in ‘world’s largest chromatography plant’
pharmafile | October 11, 2012 | News story | Manufacturing and Production | API, Novasep
French purification specialist Novasep has said it plans to invest €30 million in a new plant at its site in Mourenx for the commercial-scale production of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs).
Once completed, the new facility will be the largest chromatography for API production in the world, said Novasep. It is expected to be up and running and validated within 18 months.
“Both the development of an advanced purification process and the plant expansion within the challenging timescale are results of the sharp increase in the projected demand for a large volume, highly purified API,” said the firm in a statement.
The latest initiative comes in the wake of the opening of a new 2,000 sq. m. facility in Shanghai, China, and a €3 million investment in high-potency API production at Novasep’s Le Mans site to cater for increased demand for novel anticancer therapies and antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs).
The new plant in Mourenx will make use of Varicol continuous chromatography systems and will include columns of 1,200mm in diameter, which it claims are the largest ever built for use by the pharma industry.
“Demand for Novasep’s advanced, purification-based manufacturing capabilities in the life science industries continues to increase as drugs in development and reaching the market become more complex and specific,” said chief executive Patrick Glaser.
“This necessitates our third, and largest global plant expansion in 2012,” he added.
Novasep completed a €310 million recapitalisation programme earlier this year to help fund the new investments, including €30 million in new capital from France’s FSI strategic investment fund.
The programme yielded around €40 million in cash available for financing investment projects.
Novasep’s management has made no secret of its intention to implement a series of investment projects aimed at restoring profitability with revenues and earnings declining in 2011, compared to the prior year.
The firm’s management said at the time the 2011 results were announced that it was working on several short- and medium-term development initiatives “aimed at restoring medium-term growth and profitability”.
Phil Taylor
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