After cutting the ribbon on a 700 million euro ($757 million) plant in Vienna in October, Boehringer Ingelheim is gearing up for its next wave of spending.
The German company has earmarked more than 7 billion euros ($7.6 billion) for capital investments through 2025, it said in its annual report Tuesday.
More than 40% of the figure is set aside for “new technologies” and the expansion of the drugmaker’s research and production network in its home country as well as in the U.S., Japan, Austria, France and Spain, a company spokesman added.
The newly revealed capital investment plan comes after a year in which BI invested an all-time high 4.1 billion euros ($4.8 billion) in research and development, which represented an 11.7% increase on its 2020 R&D spend.
Meanwhile, in 2021, the company topped the 20 billion euro mark in revenue, reaching 20.6 billion euros ($24.4 billion).
“All our businesses contributed to the solid financial results in 2021, a strong achievement, especially when considering the overall pandemic and economic situation,” board member Michael Schmelmer said in BI’s annual report. “As a result, we can continue making significant investments and have strengthened our overall financial basis—and thus our independence.”
Evidenced by the plant in Vienna, which employs more than 500, a major push for the company lately has been expansion of its biopharmaceutical manufacturing capacity.
During its construction, which began in 2017, the company said its capacity would be 150,000 liters. But by its completion, the capacity had been bumped up to 185,000 liters. The cost estimate of the plant expanded over time as well, from a starting point of 500 million euros.
The plant is BI’s fourth cell culture facility, joining others in Germany, China and the U.S. Not only does BI make many of its own products, it also lends its manufacturing services to 12 of the world’s top 20 pharmas and several other smaller biotechs, the company said in its annual report.
In 2021, the drugmaker said it invested 968 million euros ($1.14 billion) in tangible fixed assets including at the large-scale production facility in Vienna and at its site in Biberach, Germany, which features a new development center for biopharma meds.
Its manufacturing business, dubbed Boehringer Ingelheim BioXcellence, garnered sales of 917 million euros ($1.08 billion) last year, the company said, a 10% increase from 2020.