GSK to set up global vaccine center near FDA, NIH
This article was originally published in Scrip
Finding itself with nine sites across the US devoted to vaccines research and development after its mega swapping deal with Novartis, GlaxoSmithKline has decided to consolidate and create a global R&D center focused on those products in Maryland – the home of the FDA and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and close to Washington, the seat of the US federal government.
GSK already had the state-of-the-art facility sitting in Rockville, Maryland – where the new global vaccines center will be housed – which meets the firm's demands for the size and technological capability required for vaccines R&D, spokeswoman Melinda Stubbee told Scrip, noting the company acquired that space through its July 2012 acquisition of Human Genome Sciences.
GSK said the new vaccines R&D center will expand its efforts to discover and develop novel vaccines across a range of pressing public health threats, including those relevant to the US.
The Rockville site will be the third vaccines hub for GSK – with the others residing in Rixensart, Belgium and Siena, Italy, the latter of which was established at a facility the London biopharmaceutical firm acquired from Basel, Switzerland-based Novartis.
GSK and Novartis just completed their major transaction last month – a deal initially announced in April 2014.
Not only does setting up the center in Maryland put GSK at the doorsteps of the FDA, the NIH and other Health and Human Services agencies, like the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), but the location also will enable the company's research teams to collaborate with critical US bio-scientific and policy vaccine leaders – particularly in the firm's emerging focus in biodefense and medical countermeasure innovation – and world global health leaders located in Washington, Ms Stubbee said.
GSK has been one of the firms pursuing an Ebola vaccine – with its product, which the company has co-developed with the NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, among the two that are the furthest along in development.
The GSK-NIAID Ebola vaccine currently is being tested in the NIH's Phase II/III PREVAIL study in Liberia, with early results showing the product is safe with a good immune response.
Relocating to Rockville is likely to aid in GSK's ongoing partnership for the Ebola vaccine, although Ms Stubbee said the company has not yet determined which R&D projects will be coming out of the new Maryland center.
"We will be doing a business review and then determining what each of the three centers will be focusing on," she said.
Ms Stubbee said Dr Rip Ballou, head of clinical research and translational science at GSK and one of the leads on the Ebola vaccine, known as cAd3-EBOZ, will be relocating from Belgium to head the new Rockville center.
She noted that Dr Ballou also is a co-creator of GSK’s malaria vaccine.
By 2016, GSK expects to have about 1,000 employees at its vaccines R&D center in Rockville, Ms Stubbee said, adding that about 400 manufacturing employees already are located at that site, which also is near some of the company’s academic partners – Johns Hopkins University and the University of Maryland.
Maryland's politicians were quick to praise GSK's new vaccines center and the jobs it will bring to the state and local community.
"GSK's investments in Montgomery County demonstrate just how well Maryland understands the needs of biotech businesses," US Senator Ben Cardin (Democrat) told Scrip in a statement. "In visiting companies from Western Maryland to the Eastern Shore, I have seen a spirit of innovation running throughout the Free State. GSK will both benefit from and bolster that spirit."
US Representative Chris Van Hollen (Democrat-Maryland) said GSK's planned Rockville center "further solidifies Maryland as a leader in vaccine development and is a great addition of good-paying jobs to the region."
"Our unique combination of federal agencies, universities and private-sector innovators is invigorating our economy, and I'm pleased that the next lifesaving vaccine could be developed right here in Maryland," Representative Van Hollen said in a statement to Scrip.
With the FDA and NIH labs in Maryland's backyard, a highly-educated workforce and a critical mass of life sciences companies, "Maryland offers GSK an excellent environment in which to grow and thrive," declared the state's newly elected Republican governor, Larry Hogan.
But Maryland's gain is Massachusetts' and Pennsylvania's loss – since those are the offices being brought together at the Rockville center.
Ms Stubbee would not discuss whether GSK anticipated laying-off employees as part of the consolidation efforts.
"In the coming weeks we'll have discussions with employees about the possibility of relocating to Rockville," she said. "In addition we're still in the process of working through organizational design and business needs; this will help us understand the impact this consolidation will have on employees."