BOTHELL — Denmark-based CMC Biopharmaceuticals plans to retain all the employees and even expand the workforce at a biotechnology manufacturing plant once operated by ICOS Corp. and which had been expected to close its doors soon.
Mads Laustsen, CMC’s chief executive officer, discussed Tuesday his intentions for the Bothell plant after announcing an agreement to buy the facility.
“We want to develop into one of the largest contract manufacturing organizations on the West Coast,” Laustsen said.
To do that, CMC will need to add to the 127 employees in Bothell and invest to allow the facility to produce late-stage and even commercial-stage biotech drugs for others. Laustsen said new jobs could be added starting next year.
The Bothell contract manufacturing facility is the last operating unit of ICOS Corp., the local biotechnology company bought for $2.3 billion by Eli Lilly &Co earlier this year.
Under CMC’s ownership, it is being renamed CMC ICOS Biologics.
Financial terms of CMC’s deal with Lilly were not disclosed. This is the first manufacturing facility in the U.S. for privately owned CMC, which got its start in 2001, Laustsen said. The company previously had business offices in Seattle and New England.
ICOS’ contract manufacturing business has specialized in making therapeutic proteins for clients with early-stage clinical trials. When Lilly bought ICOS in January, primarily to gain full ownership of the erectile dysfunction drug Cialis, it said from the beginning it did not intend to hold onto the plant.
But local economic development officials and politicians lobbied Lilly to find a buyer for the business rather than shut it down like ICOS’ local labs and business offices. While the facility stayed open to fulfill its ongoing contracts, Lilly talked to potential buyers.
CMC apparently began talking to Lilly this fall, said Deborah Knutson, president of the Snohomish County Economic Development Council.
“We’ve been waiting for this news,” Knutson said. “It’s a great way to end the ICOS story.”
Rep. Jay Inslee, who wrote letters to the chairman of Indianapolis, Ind.-based Lilly about the plant, called Tuesday’s announcement a “very positive development in a tough situation.”
Tom St. John, the former vice president of therapeutic development at ICOS, called the plant an “excellent acquisition for CMC.”
“The asset they’ve got is that team of people there,” said St. John, who’s now executive vice president for Seattle startup Fate Therapeutics. He said the facility, which started early in ICOS’ 17-year history, gained many repeat commercial customers.
Laustsen said CMC looked at other contract manufacturing facilities across the U.S., and even found some with newer or bigger equipment. But the track record of the team at the Bothell plant stood out.
Laustsen said employees at the plant received official notice Friday of CMC’s intention to buy the business. Jack Faris, president of the Washington Biotechnology &Biomedical Association, said the reaction has been uniformly positive.
“I’ve seen nothing but smiles around this place,” he said while visiting the facility Tuesday. Faris characterized CMC’s acquisition as a vote of confidence in the Puget Sound region’s biotech industry.
Assuming CMC eventually boosts production, the deal also could give Snohomish County a solid base of biotech manufacturing jobs. Already, Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals — formerly known as Berlex — is working to gain certification for a $70-million-plus drug manufacturing plant it’s built in Lynnwood. Once that is running, it will produce Leukine, an artificial form of a naturally occurring growth protein.
Reporter Eric Fetters: 425-339-3453or fetters@heraldnet.com
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