Australia's CSL, which earlier this year paused plans to put its CSL Seqirus vaccine division up for sale, has opened the doors to a new $1 billion cell-based influenza vaccine and antivenom production facility in Melbourne.
The plant will replace the Parkville, Melbourne, egg-based vaccine manufacturing site CSL has operated for 80 years, the company said in a Dec. 2 press release. The new facility has the capacity to churn out cell-based seasonal flu vaccines for domestic supply and also meet demand from regions including Asia, Europe, the Middle East and the Americas.
Production at the 28,400-square-meter (305,695-square-foot) Melbourne plant will support a supply chain CSL valued at $300 million annually to the Australian economy. The site is equipped with three key buildings that will house production of seasonal and pandemic cell-based influenza vaccines, antivenoms and Q-fever vaccines, as well as quality assurance labs and administrative space, CSL said.
“This facility is an investment in the health and economy of Australia and the world,” Paul McKenzie, CSL’s chief executive, said in a statement. “It will expand global capacity and access to our next-generation flu vaccines that will help reduce the significant burden of influenza around the world.”
CSL in August rolled out plans under a corporate restructure to divest its Seqirus vaccine division. The move formed part of a plan to save the company $500 million to $550 million progressively over the next three years.
However, in October, CSL temporarily retreated from those plans, citing increased volatility in the U.S. influenza vaccine market. At the time, the company cited insurance claims data that forecast this season's flu vaccination rates in the U.S. would decline by 12% overall and by 14% for people ages 65 and older compared with last year.
The following month, CSL unveiled plans to spend $1.5 billion to expand its presence in the U.S. over the next five years. The move has been crafted to bolster CSL's production capacity for plasma-derived therapies and support the U.S. supply chain for its medicines.