GE Healthcare is to manufacture single-use consumables for bioprocessing in Weihai, China, in collaboration with Wego Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd, one of the largest healthcare technology suppliers in the country. This collaboration will decrease product delivery times for Chinese biopharmaceutical companies, enhance customer support locally and increase their access to a wide range of standard and custom single-use products to help them bring therapeutics to patients faster.
The first single-use consumables produced at Wego’s manufacturing facility will be available later this month, with continued offerings throughout 2019. All products will be manufactured using Fortem, GE Healthcare’s materially advanced, single-use platform film, which simplifies the customer validation and approval processes by incorporating GE’s full range of bioprocessing systems.
“We are excited to play a critical role within the Chinese biopharma industry by ensuring efficient lead times and security of supply, which ultimately helps the local manufacturers to serve patients faster. China continues to lead in the adoption of innovative single-use biomanufacturing solutions, including GE Healthcare’s end-to-end biomanufacturing solutions KUBio and FlexFactory,” said Olivier Loeillot, General Manager, BioProcess, GE Healthcare Life Sciences. “This highlights that China has a large installed space coupled with a strong biopharma pipeline predominantly based on single-use technologies.”
The Chinese biopharma market grew by eight percent in 2017 (1) and the estimated annual growth rate (CAGR) for monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) is over 25 percent (2) for the coming years. The rapid development is supported by the Chinese government’s Made in China 2025 industry plan that emphasises biotechnical innovation.
"It is an honour to have this important strategic collaboration with GE Healthcare that supports our focused vision on technological innovation. GE Healthcare is one of the largest healthcare solution providers in the world and with its strong technical resources and global know-how, we can meet the Chinese customers’ expectations efficiently, helping to localise the development and manufacture of single-use consumables. This will support the development of more affordable, high-quality therapeutics in China,” said Xian-feng Huang, General Manager, Wego Pharmaceutical.
Sources:
- (1) IMS Data
- (2) IMS Data