In an announcement made on Twitter, Sanofi has shared the news that it has begun work on its new ‘factory of the future’ in Singapore.
Construction on the first of two Evolutive Vaccine Facilities (EVFs) with funding from a combined investment of 900m euros (around £748m) is underway, with the company presenting the EVFs as a stepping stone to ‘pave the way for future vaccine innovation across the world’.
The new site in Singapore is part of Sanofi’s goal to create two sites for pandemic preparedness that will take place over the next five years at an estimated cost of $1.3bn. The facility will be nearly carbon neutral, using electricity produced from its own fitted solar panels.
The French pharma company plans for the site in Singapore to be operational by 2026 and will be the first manufacturing facility of its kind in Asia. According to Sanofi, the new site will take advantage of Singapore’s position as a regional ‘innovation hub for the healthcare industry’.
The second site will be build in France, with both factories able to produce between three and four different vaccines at once. Comparably, current manufacturing sites only allow for the production of a single vaccine.
The EVFs have been designed to accommodate the ‘agile and flexible’ production of multiple vaccine and biologics platforms, including mRNA, enzymes and monoclonal antibodies.
The Singapore EVF is being funded with 400m euros (about £332m) as a fully digitalised and modular vaccine manufacturing plant. The company’s vision of the EVF is to be able to roll out the production of vaccines for Asia on a bigger and more efficient scale.
In an interview with the Singapore daily, The Straits Times, Sanofi’s executive vice president for vaccines, Thomas Triomphe, said: “We know that COVID-19 is not going to be here forever.
“So with these evolutive facilities, we are already planting the seeds and preparing for the next pandemic, and this is the level of agility that you need.”
Triomphe added: “To proceed with massive investments like the EVF, you need to have a whole ecosystem of suppliers of raw materials, of starters, of innovation technologies in the same area.”