During my MBA course, Professor Pierre Casse — then at the International Institute for Management Development (IMD) in Lausanne, Switzerland — regularly reminded us that one key to success was constantly finding new ways to “delight and inspire your clients†by creating value. SAFC achieved that objective in its “Overcoming Supply Chain Vulnerability and Lowering Risk in Biopharmaceutical Manufacturing†symposium 17–18th June 2014 in Turnberry, Scotland. Along with a day of industry insight, the event included a visit and tour…
Business
Supply Chain Challenges in the Biopharmaceutical Industry: A Case Study Following the 2011 Tsunami in Japan
Global manufacturing of biopharmaceuticals for human use helps save the lives of millions of people and is a large commitment to public health. The industry operates in an environment with financial uncertainties and complex international supply chains, so the question of risk mitigation is paramount. There is an expectation that comprehensive risk mitigation programs should be in place to minimize the risk of supply chain interruptions that would negatively affect the manufacture of these vital therapeutics. Here we share how…
Why the “Central Dogma” Isn’t
For decades, professional biology education programs, universities, community colleges, and some high schools have inoculated students with the phrase central dogma to refer to the basic paradigm that “DNA encodes RNA, which encodes for protein†(1). Although that is in large part true, we do need to break with tradition, let science take its course, and call it like it is. Background In 1970, Francis Crick’s seminal paper in Nature (“Central Dogma of Molecular Biologyâ€) was published. Eventually its premise…
Due Diligence of Early Stage Technologies: Achieving Rapid Product Development with Low R&D Costs
Increased understanding of human diseases at molecular and cellular levels is leading to development of novel life-science technologies. Such advancements typically pertain to discovery and manufacturing of novel human therapeutics, new modes of drug delivery, and novel diagnostic technologies. The majority of those technologies are developed by early stage biopharmaceutical companies that have a greater appetite for risk than do larger companies. Early stage biopharmaceutical companies, however, have limited capital raised through personal sources, angel investors, venture capital, or government…
Risk Management in Financing of Capital Expansions: How One CMO Grows with Its Customers
BioVectra Inc. is an eastern Canadian contract manufacturing organization (CMO) with expertise in both synthetic chemistry and biomanufacturing techniques. In recent years, it has obtained specialized knowledge in production of highly potent small molecules from fermentation and functionalized methoxypoly(ethylene glycol) products (mPEGs). The focus of BioVectra’s contract manufacturing business is the transfer and scale-up of processes for manufacturing its clients’ products under current good manufacturing practices (CGMPs) as appropriate for the clinical stage of each product. In the current environment,…
Advocating for Advanced Therapies
My sense is that we’ve come a long way and that 2013 was actually a very good year — perhaps maybe even the best year ever for regenerative medicines and advanced therapies. Clearly the financial markets have allowed us to do more in terms of raising capital to fund projects in this space, and we are seeing a growing interest in the sector in the investor community. We’ve seen a number of major financing events over the course of the…
Cell Therapy Will Transform the Future of Medicine
The third annual IBC Cell Therapy Bioprocessing conference was held in Bethesda, MD, on 21–22 October 2013. It brought pioneers in the development of cell-based therapies together with companies that have enabling technologies, such as bioreactors, cell culture media, and advanced monitoring software. After the conference, I discussed the highlights and key themes coming out of the event with Dr. Phil Vanek, general manager of cell bioprocessing at GE Healthcare Life Sciences in Westborough, MA. Also an instructor for advanced…
Thinking Strategically
At the recent Phacilitate Gene and Cell Therapy Conference (27–29 January 2014 in Washington, DC), BPI’s editor in chief Anne Montgomery and publisher Brian Caine spoke with Richard Grant, executive vice president, life sciences, at Invetech (www.invetech.com.au); and Brian Hanrahan, program manager at Invetech. They and their colleagues were instrumental in advising us how to bring ongoing discussions of regenerative medicines into BPI four years ago for the first Cell Therapy Supplement issue. We asked them to comment generally on…
Essentials in Quality By Design
Quality by design (QbD) is a systematic approach to drug development. It begins with predefined objectives and emphasizes product and process understanding and process control, all based on sound science, data-based decision making, and quality risk management (QRM). As introduced by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), QbD brings modern drug development methodologies to chemistry, manufacturing, and control (CMC) teams working on biologics, pharmaceuticals, and vaccines. The innovations associated with QbD are not so much the development concepts (which…
Activatable Immunoconjugates for Target Cancer-Cell–Specific Diagnosis and Therapy
In cancer treatment, early diagnosis and targeted therapies are assumed to yield the highest cure rates. However, most current methods are limited by their low sensitivity to early disease and a lack of specificity for targeted cell killing. Newly developed, activatable immunoconjugates assist in the accurate detection of cancer through in vivo imaging with high target-to-background contrast (1,2). They also provide for the possibility of highly specific, light-mediated treatment with minimal effects on healthy cells surrounding tumors (3). In fact,…