GSK halted production in Rajahmundry, India and Eisai postponed the opening of a facility in nearby Vizag on Saturday after days of unrest over plans to create a new state, Telangana, within Andhra Pradesh.
Canadian CMO Patheon will consolidate its Puerto Rican activities at its facility in Manati and sell or close its plant in neighbouring Caguas by 2011.
Unigene Laboratories is laying off one-third of its workforce and temporarily suspending production of some materials in an attempt to cut its operating expenses by up to $10m (€6.8m) in 2010.
Sanofi-Aventis will manufacture and supply recombinant human insulin crystals to Generex Biotechnology for use in Oral-lyn commercial production and clinical trials.
Watson Pharmaceuticals gained US rights to market a generic version of Lipitor (atorvastatin) in 2011 with the acquisition of non-branded drugmaker Arrow Group late last week.
Roche has licensed Aegis Therapeutics’ ProTek stabilisation technology, which uses GRAS excipients to prevent aggregation and therefore improve production of peptide and protein drugs.
Indian API maker Avon Organics’ share price rocketed 10 per cent on the Bombay exchange yesterday after the US launch of a generic herpes treatment by Ranbaxy Laboratories.
Sanofi-Aventis plans to participate with a Russian state-owned corporation in a project to attract innovative drug manufacturers to the country, using its insulin facility as a pilot initiative.
Indian drugmaker Ranbaxy Laboratories has withdrawn stocks of its acne drug Sotret in the US for the second time this year after some tablets were found to be out of specification.
Novartis says its new cell culture plant in Holly Springs, North Carolina could begin making its flu vaccine boosting MF59 adjuvant as early as next month if approved by US regulators.
The FDA encourages innovation in excipients to develop new drugs or improve approved therapeutics and IPEC is helping to drive acceptance of these novel products, according to BASF.
Spanish ingredient supplier Cafosa has launched a new directly compressible pharmaceutical excipient for medicated chewing gums that, it claims, can boost patient compliance.
Regulatory enforcement efforts to tackle counterfeit and substandard APIs are in disarray, according to Guy Villax, CEO of Hovione, who spoke at AAPS about the scale of the problem.
French drug delivery specialist Galenix has named DSM’s pharmaceutical products unit as its manufacturing and co-marketing partner as it continues to efforts build its global presence.
Pfizer will close six R&D facilities in the US and the UK, reducing its global capacity by over a third following completion of its acquisition of Wyeth.
New US Pharmacopeial Convention (USP) monographs designed to prevent adulteration of key excipients with diethylene glycol (DEG) and ethylene glycol (EG) have been published ahead of their official implementation date in February.
US contract services firm Catalent has launched a new test service capable of detecting trace amounts of the toxic chemical melamine in pharmaceuticals.
Novartis is investing $250m (€170m) to construct a facility in China focused on research, development and manufacture of APIs and has earmarked a further $1bn to expand its R&D activities in the country.
Lonza cuts 2009 earning guidance and may reduce its workforce under “Project Bond” cost cutting plan after a Q3 characterized by an “accumulation of unexpected events”
Portuguese CMO Hovione has bought an aseptic spray-drying line from US firm Acusphere and says that the demand for the technology is increasing as drug firms aim to boost bioavailability.
BASF says its new Soluplus excipient will help meet demand for solubilising agents that are compatible with hot melt extrusion (HME) manufacturing methods.
The FDA has warned consumers about the spread of counterfeit H1N1 treatments after the agency bought products advertised as Tamiflu (oseltamivir) that contained none of the active ingredient.
The American Peptide Company (APC) plans to set up an R&D unit at its facility in Sunnydale, California to better serve growing demand for innovative technologies.
Swiss healthcare services giant Lonza has withdrawn its offer for Canadian CMO Patheon, citing value considerations, rejection of the bid by JLL and the availability of alternatives.
The EC’s plan to make excipients comply with GMP is “still alive”, according to Cargill which spoke to in-PharmaTechnologist at CPhI about its Zerose erythritol product that it claims can improve compliance.
Arch Pharmalabs is continuing its push to serve innovative pharma by adding simulated moving bed (SMB) technology, becoming the first in India to offer the offer the system for plant scale API manufacture.
The USAID and USP have launched a campaign to tackle counterfeits in Cambodia and Greater Mekong Subregion, using a film to educate the population of the dangers of fakes and need to use legitimate pharmacies.
Canadian drugmaker Labopharm says its Italian API maker Gruppo Angelini has resolved all the US FDA concerns about processes used to make a once-a day version of the depression drug trazodone.
We look ahead to CPhI 2009 which takes place in Madrid, Spain next week and will showcase the world’s leading ingredients, contract services, machinery and biotech companies.
Epistem says its focus on epithelial stem cell services and growth of its CRO and biomarker businesses helped it to stave off the downturn and post a strong set of financials of the fiscal year ended June 30.
From Thursday onwards all formulations of the blood thinner heparin shipped in the US will be only 90 per cent the strength of previous version, according to the FDA.
Buoyed by an increase in repeat business and deals with large pharma companies Ash Stevens has begun a $6m (€4.1m) expansion of its API manufacturing facility, with further phases planned to occur over the next six years.
Canadian biologics CMO BioVectra has been contracted to make trial supplies of the candidate cancer treatment Prolanta by US biopharmaceutical firm Oncolix.
UK based contract API maker Aesica Pharmaceuticals has been granted a Home Office license to make controlled substances at its facility in Cramlington, Northumberland.
Ampac Fine Chemicals (AFC) has added three new commercial-scale Hastelloy liquid-liquid centrifuges to its API making business in a move that, it says, will increase batch size and lower manufacturing costs.
Israeli generics giant Teva Pharmaceutical Industries will close one of its manufacturing plants in the Czech Republic by the end of the year, resulting in the loss of around 400 jobs.
