Bayer, intent on its cell therapy ambitions, plots $200M plant at overhauled Berkeley campus: report – FiercePharma

Bayer's cell and gene therapy ambitions have quickly taken flightas the German conglomerate locks up new partners and pumps cash into promising up-and-comers. Now, the company is looking to beef up its cell offerings at the Berkeley campus where it has separately blueprinted a $1.2 billion, 30-year expansion.

Bayer has drawn up plans for a $200 million cell therapy plantin Berkeley, where a separatecell culture facility and cell and gene therapy labs are due to come online later this year, Bioprocess International reports.

Called the Cell Therapy Launch Facility, the new plant is the latest in a series of cell and gene therapy movesby Bayer, as the company rapidly carves out a foothold inthe bustling field. In the past few monthsalone,it bought out adeno-associated virus (AAV)specialist Asklepios BioPharmaceutical, launched a cell and gene therapy platform and plugged millions of investment dollarsintogene therapy players Metagenomi and Senti Biosciences.

As for the latestfacility, the 98,000-square-foot plantand first production moduleshould be ready to goby mid-2023, a Bayer spokesperson told the news outlet.

To start, the factory will turn out clinical materials for Bayer's cell therapy pipeline, though both the launch facility and the cell culture plant, dubbed theCell Culture Technology Center (CCTC), will eventually chip in on "global commercial launches of multiple products," the spokesperson said.

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A second production module isalready planned for the site, which could eventually produce up to four cell therapy products at the same time, Jens Vogel, SVP and global head of biotech at Bayer, said in a recentinterview with San Francisco Business Times.

Bayer counts a number of early-stage cell and gene hopefuls among its pipeline, includinggene therapiesfor congestive heart failure, Parkinson's and Pompe disease, as well as a CAR-T cell therapy candidate forhigh mesothelin-expressing tumors.

Bayer didn't say when construction on the launch facility would begin, and the company didn't immediately respond to Fierce Pharma's request for comment. The 40,000-square-foot, $150 million technology centeris expected to be up and running in late 2021.

The launch facility is separate from Bayer's bigger expansion plans in Berkeley, the company told Bioprocess International. In July, Bayer proposed a site development plan that would addabout 1 million square feet of new work space and double its workforce in Berkeleyby some1,000 employees.

The CCTC, expected to open later this year, will "combine automation, digital capabilities and single-use bioprocessing technologies to streamline production" on Bayer's cardiology and oncology pipeline,Judy Chou, former global head of Bayer Biotech, said in a May 2019 statement.

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Bayer has been a tenant in Berkeley, where it cranks out hemophilia A treatments, since the 1970s. The site received a $100 million facelift in 2017but was also victim ofjob cuts in 2018 as the companyreorganized manufacturing of its hemophilia factor VIII replacement therapiesKogenate, Kovaltry andJivi.

Meanwhile, Bayer has taken a page out of the M&A playbook as it looks to solidify its place in the cell and genefield. In October, the company agreed to pay $2 billion upfront and potentially $2 billion more in milestones to snap upadeno-associated virus (AAV) gene therapy specialist Asklepios BioPharmaceutical.

Asklepios, also known as AskBio, boasts a pipeline ofpreclinical and clinical candidates for neuromuscular, central nervous system, cardiovascular and metabolic diseases, and came on board withgene therapy manufacturing capabilities, which the company now uses in a CDMO capacity.

On the cell therapy front, Bayer in December teamed up withAtara Biotherapeutics to work on anoff-the-shelf T-cell immunotherapy fortough-to-treat lung cancers. That same month, the company launched a cell and gene platform to assist its swelling Rolodex of partners across the product lifecycle. And amid all that, Bayer co-leda $65 million funding round forgene editing player Metagenomi and a$105 million series Bfor next-gen gene therapy startup Senti Biosciences.

A little more than a year before that, Bayer laid out$240 million to nab theremaining stake in its cell therapy joint venture, BlueRock Therapeutics.

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Bayer, intent on its cell therapy ambitions, plots $200M plant at overhauled Berkeley campus: report - FiercePharma