WuXi plots $1.4B production and R&D center in Singapore, where it will employ 1,500

As more and more biopharmas set up shop in Singapore, CRDMO WuXi Biologics is plotting a massive investment that will add more than 1,000 jobs in the coming years.  

WuXi Bio is laying out $1.4 billion over the next 10 years to beef up research and development plus large-scale drug substance and drug product manufacturing in Singapore. The upgrade is expected to add 120,000 liters of biomanufacturing capacity to the company’s global network by 2026. Further, the site will employ a whopping 1,500 R&D and production staffers once complete, WuXi Bio said in a release.

The new Singapore site follows a spree of WuXi Bio investments in the U.S., Ireland, Germany and China, the company notes. The planned center also supports WuXi’s global dual sourcing strategy, which ensures multiple sites are on deck to tackle clients’ production projects.

It's hardly WuXi’s first foray into the garden city, either. Back in April, WuXi Advanced Therapies—a unit of parent company WuXi AppTec—linked up with Singapore’s Bioprocessing Technology Institute in a bid to advance cell and gene therapy production in the Asia-Pacific region.

Aside from WuXi, pharma majors such as Sanofi and Takeda have also set their sights on Singapore. Last spring, Sanofi said it would plug 400 million euros into a new vaccine production site in Singapore over the next five years. The move is designed to boost supply in Asia and complement the drugmaker’s existing production footprint in Europe and North America.

The French pharma kicked off construction on the so-called Evolutive Vaccine Facility in April of this year.

Separately, Japan-based pharma Takeda in September broke ground on a $14 million expansion of its Singapore facility, which is due to become the company’s first “net zero carbon emissions” building, Takeda said at the time.