U.K. contract manufacturer Aesica is counting on a bullish market for solid dose diabetes drugs, and the company has poured $48 million into one of its plants to meet the demand.
Aesica's investment pays for a roughly 33,000-square-foot expansion that will house production of Type 2 diabetes treatments. The Queenborough, U.K., facility will come online in November, Aesica said, eventually employing about 55 people. The latest expansion is designed so that its capacity can be more than doubled in a future project, the company said, and considering the demand for diabetes treatments, that may well be necessary.
As FiercePharmaManufacturing notes, the global market for diabetes drugs could swell to about $58 billion by 2018, up from $35 billion today, driven by the high-profile pipelines of companies like Sanofi ($SNY), Novo Nordisk ($NVO) and Eli Lilly ($LLY).
For Aesica, that would mean a leap in need for contract development and manufacturing around the world, demand the company is prepared to meet, CEO Robert Hardy said.
"The new investment and opening of the High Capacity Manufacturing Facility marks another key milestone for our company and a further step toward achieving our vision to be the world's No. 1 supplier of APIs and formulated products to the pharmaceutical industry," Hardy said in a statement
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