DSM Biologics aims for global leadership position among independent contract manufacturers for the pharmaceutical industry

10-May-2001

DSM Biologics, a business unit of the DSM fine chemicals business group, today brought on stream a new 2,000-litre fermentation unit at its Montreal (Quebec, Canada) site for the preparation of biopharmaceuticals on the basis of cell cultures. This new CAN 9 million unit, which was officially opened by Peter Elverding, chairman of the DSM Managing Board, is DSM Biologics' response to the increased demand for fermentation capacity, in particular for the preparation of biopharmaceutical products. The new fermentation unit consists of clean rooms and a fermentor train. The fermentor train consists of two seed fermentors of 50 and 320 litres for culturing cells and a 2,000-litre production fermentor. DSM Biologics amply meets the quality standards set by the pharmaceutical industry (cGMP). The DSM Biologics site in Montreal is jointly owned by DSM and Societé générale de financement du Québec (SGF).

Ambitions

The fact that the new unit was officially opened by DSM Managing Board chairman Peter Elverding underlined the importance of the role played by DSM Biologics' ambitions in DSM's transformation into a specialty company. The ceremony was also attended by representatives of the Province of Quebec, which supports the establishment and development of advanced biotechnological industries in the Montreal region.

In his speech Peter Elverding made reference to the strong growth in the market for biopharmaceutical products. "Some 30% of all new pharmaceutical products in clinical trial are currently made on the basis of biopharmaceutical technologies," he said.

Current global capacity for biopharmaceutical contract manufacturing is not capable of meeting future demand. Three years ago sales were about CAN 300 million. Within the next five years the market is expected to grow to around CAN 2 billion.

Société générale de financement du Québec

The mission of the Société générale de financement du Québec is, in cooperation with partners and under conditions of normal profitability, to carry out economic development projects. Since its restructuring in 1998, SGF has generated investments of close to CAN 4.4 billion and created over 19,400 direct and indirect jobs in projects that have reached the operating stage, without counting the thousands of jobs created during the construction stage. As at September 30, 2000, the consolidated assets of SGF ran at over CAN 2.2 billion. SGF has 52 international partners carrying out operations in Quebec.

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