www.checkbiotech.org ; www.raupp.info ; www.czu.cz

Sigma-Aldrich Group member SAFC made its presence felt at the recent CPhI in
Paris with announcements regarding its expansion activities in transgenic
manufacturing and India, October 2006 by Kirsty Barnes.

First of all, the company said its Pharma business segment is expanding
its cGMP protein purification capacity ?to meet increased market demand for
therapeutic proteins from plant- and animal-sourced starting materials.?

?Our new facility will be one of the only cGMP transgenic manufacturing
facilities in the world and also one of the largest,? SAFC spokesperson
Amanda Halford told a press conference.

?The market is moving away from purely animal-based products and we want to
make sure we are well positioned to move with the market,? she said.

The new operations will be added to the firm's St. Louis, Missouri
manufacturing campus and will feature completely separate plant and animal
protein processing facilities to eliminate potential cross-contamination.

The natural and recombinant (transgenic) plant proteins facility will occupy
22,000 sq. ft. for its upstream and downstream processing operations.

?This is a huge capacity which is important when you consider how much plant
matter you need to use in production,? said Halford.

The animal-sourced proteins facility will encompass over 20,000 sq. ft. for
upstream processing and be supported by an area that contains over 300,000
sq. ft. of total capacity.

SAFC said it is working closely with numerous transgenic plant platform
companies to develop commercial-scale processes for proteins previously
available only from animal-sourced materials and for therapeutic proteins
and monoclonal antibodies.

The company said it is also experiencing strong demand for cGMP proteins
from animal-sourced materials for use in medical device applications and
active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs).

?Recent successes in the transgenic plant market combined with advancements
of several of our natural APIs derived from plants have provided impetus to
expand our capacity,? said SAFC President, Frank Wicks.

?We have several projects moving into late-stage clinical trials and
commercial manufacturing and are expanding to meet growing customer demand.?

Meanwhile, SAFC also chose the CPhI to announce that its Pharma business
segment's 139,000 sq. ft. medicinal chemistry facility located in Bangalore,
India, is now ready for operation.

The facility features over 60,000 sq. ft. of production and R&D laboratory
space, including manufacturing suites for chemical development and
production to 50L scale and an on-site warehouse, said the firm.

?The operation offers a complete range of pre-clinical, process development
and scale-up services combined with access to the favourable economics of
India.?

SAFC said the $12m (?9.6m) facility is part of its ?build or acquire?
strategy, put in place to meet the increased demands for its medicinal
chemistry and cGMP manufacturing services.

Other recent SAFC capacity and technology expansions include the purchase of
the SAFC Arklow, Ireland facility - a large-scale API manufacturing site
with 90,000L of cGMP capacity; the acquisition of SAFC Pharmorphix, a
Cambridge, UK based solid-state research studies company; and an $18m
expansion of the SAFC Madison high-potency chemistry facility.

?We are particulary trying to build up or acquire new capacity and
capabilities in low-cost areas such as India,? said Halford.

?All our staff at the new Indian plant have been fully trained at our
existing facilities in Manchester and Swizerland,? she told
In-PharmaTechnologist.com.

[www.outsourcing-pharma.com]

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