Dive Brief:
- CSL-Behring on Monday broke ground on a $1.5 billion expansion of its manufacturing facility in Kankakee, Illinois.
- The newly expanded facility will substantially increase the company’s ability to produce plasma-derived therapies for people living with rare and serious diseases like hemophilia and immune deficiencies, CSL said. It is expected to be operational by 2031.
- The project is expected to create at least 300 new pharmaceutical jobs and about 800 construction and related jobs. In a deal that is still being finalized, state officials have offered more than $200 million in tax incentives to secure the project in Kankakee, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker said at a press conference.
Dive Insight:
CSL said the addition to the plant is part of its global expansion strategy. It has invested more than $3 billion in its U.S. operations since 2018, creating more than 6,500 new American jobs and bringing its total U.S. headcount to nearly 19,000.
The expansion at CSL Behring’s Kankakee plant will increase production capacity for CSL’s top immunoglobulin therapies, Privigen and Hizentra, Pritzker said in a press release. It will incorporate the company’s Horizon 2 manufacturing process, which enables significantly greater production of immunoglobulin from the same base amount of plasma.
More than 1,200 full-time employees currently work at the site, all of whom are expected to be retained.
“As the need for plasma-derived therapies continues to grow in the U.S. and globally, expanding our Kankakee site further strengthens this key hub in our supply network,” CEO and Managing Director Gordon Naylor said in a statement.
According to CSL, plasma-derived therapies treat serious and rare diseases by using proteins found in human plasma. Plasma is part of the blood and contains proteins essential to critical bodily functions, such as fighting infection or helping blood to clot. When specific plasma proteins are missing or do not function properly, this can cause major health conditions that can be life threatening and require ongoing treatment.
Many of the conditions that plasma-derived therapies treat are relatively rare but collectively affect thousands of people, including those living with hemophilia, primary immunodeficiency and hereditary angioedema.
Plasma-derived therapies are also used as a lifesaving standard of care for many emergency and life-threatening conditions. These include trauma, such as car accidents, burns, shock, and certain maternal health conditions, such as postpartum hemorrhage.
