Sanofi investment to enhance antibody bioproduction in France

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Sanofi is investing over €40 million in its Lyon Gerland site, supporting antibody bioproduction in France.

A portion of this, €25 million, will be directed toward production and development of Sanofi’s second generation of its polyclonal antibody Thymoglubulin. It is used for transplantation and is manufactured exclusively at the Lyon Gerland site, Sanofi stated.

Furthermore, to address the demand due to more transplant patients worldwide, the company highlighted developed a new manufacturing process to increase production capacity, enhancing the reliability of supply and lowering Thymoglubulin’s environmental impact. Sanofi explained that the initial industrial batches will be produced next year and the first commercial batches will be available two years later.

Supporting production of diabetes medicine

Development of the Lyon Gerland site enables internal production of a drug for patients with preclinical type 1 diabetes, previously produced outside the EU and not by Sanofi. The bioproduction area will begin development early next year, with the first batches being produced by the end of next year. These will be available for marketing from 2027, according to Sanofi.

Investing in bioproduction

“With this significant investment, we are strengthening our footprint and leadership in bioproduction from France to serve our ambitions in immunology… this investment serves as a new step to allow us to accelerate its increased role in serving patients in France and around the world,” commented Charles Wolf, General Manager France, Sanofi.

In addition, an investment of over €15 million is planned to internalise and localise production in France of monoclonal antibodies for type 1 diabetes. Specifically, the company anticipates a future bioproduction need to localise production of the type 1 diabetes drug Tzield.

In May, Sanofi committed an additional investment of €1 billion in bioproduction, to build a new facility In Vitry-sur-Seine, France, which will “double the site’s monoclonal antibody production capacity”, Sanofi explained.