Lonza Completes Divestment of Sites to NextPharma

Lonza completed the divestment of its Ploermel, France and Edinburgh, UK sites to NextPharma, exiting both softgels and liquid-filled hard capsules for the pharma market but retaining capability for feasibility studies as part of a technology selection offering.

The Ploermel and Edinburgh sites employ around 260 and 130 permanent staff respectively. They produce liquid-filled hard capsules, including Licaps, and softgels for high potent and hormonal products.

NextPharma offers specialized CDMO services in oral and topical, including sterile ophthalmic, finished dosage forms. NextPharma plans to broaden its technology offering into lipid based finished dosage forms—softgels and liquid-filled hard capsules—in addition to offering high potency capabilities and New Chemical Entity (NCE) development services.

Gordon Bates, President and Head of Small Molecules, Lonza, said, “The strategic divestment of our Ploermel and Edinburgh sites will enable NextPharma to benefit from operational synergies and optimize existing expertise and technologies. In this context, as we close the divestment process, we are confident that NextPharma is well placed to develop and grow both sites to their full potential. We wish to thank the leadership teams and employees at the Ploermel and Edinburgh sites for their continuing dedication and professionalism during the transition period.”

Peter Burema, CEO of NextPharma, said, “We are very excited at adding two new centers of excellence, at Ploermel and Edinburgh, to NextPharma’s manufacturing network, allowing us to further broaden our technology offering for both our existing and new customers. These technologies, combined with the know-how and expertise of the employees at both sites, will provide additional solutions for drug formulations which will benefit patients across the world. On behalf of the whole NextPharma team, I welcome our new colleagues, and together we look forward to continuing to further develop and grow NextPharma as a leading and well-respected European CDMO.”