Samsung Biologics to open research center in U.S. in April

Samsung Biologics will venture into a new business area with a research lab scheduled to open in April in the United States.

Speaking at the annual JP Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco on Wednesday, the Korean company has revealed its plan to take its business abroad, starting with a new contract development (CDO) laboratory in the U.S. and later expanding the research area into Europe and Asia.

Samsung Biologics aims to run at least 18 Contract Development Organization (CDO) projects this year. Following launching its CDO projects for the first time in 2017, the company transformed into a contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO), and became a contract research organization (CRO) and a small contract manufacturing organization (sCMO) last year.

Samsung Biologics Vice President John Rim said the company is the world’s largest producer in CMO with a production capacity of 364,000 liters. Through the parallel industry, Samsung Biologics has drastically reduced the time taken to build and operate factories by 40 percent compared to its competitors. “We are planning to build the fourth plant around 2022 when the third plant will be ready to operate at its full capacity,” said the vice president.

“Last year, Samsung Biologics ran 35 CMO projects, 42 CDO projects and 10 CRO projects and developed 47 U.S. Food and Drug Administration-approved products, which makes the company a global biotech company,” Samsung Biologics President Kim Tae-han said.


Dong-Jun Heo hungry@donga.com