Already billed as the world's largest dedicated gene and cell therapy manufacturing facility in the world, Lonza's 300,000 square-foot site in Pearland is poised to grow even more as it taps into emerging opportunities in the industry, company leaders said Tuesday.
"We are entering a new era of medicine ... where fragments of ourselves—our own cells, our own genes—will be the next medicines," said Marc Funk, the chief operating officer of Lonza's biotechnology and pharmaceutical segment. "This is why we came here to Pearland-Houston and celebrating what we have done so far today."
At its
ribbon cutting on Tuesday, the company pointed to its partnerships with treatment providers and researchers as keys to unlocking the potential of the facility.
"I don't consider this a manufacturing facility. I consider this a house of hope," said Nick Leschly, CEO of
bluebird bio, one of the firms working with Lonza to produce treatments for genetic disorders and cancer.
The Pearland site will specialize in two processes: mass-producing virus "shuttles" that can deliver new genetic material into a patient's cells, and personalized cell treatments that take cells from a patient that are treated and then put back into the body.
"One of the really exciting things is, we're talking about cures, not drug treatments," said Ricardo Jimenez, site director for the Pearland facility.
These efforts have been underway at the company's location near the Texas Medical Center, but officials said they had no room to grow there. The new building off Kirby Drive and the additional 19 acres Lonza has purchased next to it suggest that won't be a problem anytime soon.
"When we started looking at where to grow, to expand, it made sense to look here. The experts are here. The support is here. The Texas Medical Center is here; all of this came together," Lonza CEO Richard Ridinger said.
By the end of the year, all 170 of Houston's Lonza employees will have moved into the new building along with an additional 30 hires, Jimenez said. At full capacity, the building could support as many as 400 employees. Most of these positions will require advanced degrees and expertise.
"This area has a benefit for that," Ridinger said. "We will attract from the area, but we will also attract talented people to move here."
Switzerland-based Lonza's network has global reach, with gene/cell facilities in Singapore and the Netherlands.
In 2017, Lonza's pharmaceutical and biotechnology segment, which includes cell and gene therapy, grew its sales by almost 19 percent to over $2.1 billion, according to the
company's annual report, representing about 40 percent of its total sales.