Member Spotlight: Q&A with Andy Topping, CSO, FUJIFILM Diosynth Biotechnologies
BIA regularly spotlights member companies and the great work they are doing to advance the life sciences industry and support the patients we serve. This month, we spoke with Andy Topping, PhD, CSO of FUJIFILM Diosynth Biotechnologies. Andy has served as Chief Scientific Officer since October 2015. Over his tenure, he has served in several scientific roles working with customers to develop innovative and scientifically sound solutions to programmes. As CSO, Andy oversees all the innovation initiatives at the company.
Q: What does the company do?
FUJIFILM Diosynth Biotechnologies is a world-leading cGMP Contract Development and Manufacturing Organisation (CDMO). We provide comprehensive services to develop and manufacture protein biologics, vaccines and advanced therapies for our clients. We don’t have drugs of our own and our mission is to be our clients’ CDMO Partner for Life - to strategically support their products throughout development and commercialisation and to make a difference in the lives of patients globally. We are a trusted partner to some of the most pioneering and prominent biopharmaceutical companies in the world.
Across the broad range of modalities we support, our industry-leading technology platforms offer high-productivity processes and methodologies with proven timelines and reduced risk, building quality and patient safety into the manufacturing processes. Our locations in the UK, Denmark and US are highly integrated, offering agility and flexibility from preclinical to large-scale commercialisation.
Q: What have you been up to recently here in the UK?
With a strong, growing demand for microbial, cell culture and viral gene therapy services, in 2021 we announced a £400 million investment in our site in Billingham, Teesside in the United Kingdom, the largest investment in British biopharmaceutical manufacturing for decades. This will add significant additional capacity and technologies to our Billingham campus, along with 350 new jobs. The new assets will triple existing cell culture capacity and bring cGMP facilities to operate our innovative MaruX™ continuous manufacturing processes. Additionally, it increases our microbial fermentation capacity by two-thirds and provides a new facility greatly expanding gene therapy development and manufacture which we currently offer from Darlington in the UK, as well as sites in the US.
Q: What do you see as the biggest challenge facing the life sciences industry today?
Keeping up! Science is advancing fast, biotechs and academic research labs are developing more novel medicines, more quickly than ever before. These offer incredible potential benefits to patients but can only become real products if they can be consistently and economically made. The path to getting these medicines to patients is not only arduous but often unclear and companies face regulatory and technology hurdles, a shortage of scientific talent and straight-up manufacturing capacity challenges. An essential part of our strategy and execution as a CDMO is to anticipate requirements, build technical teams with broad skills and process understanding plus build flexible facilities − after all in five years' time we may need to manufacture a product type that doesn’t even exist today.
Q: Why did you join BIA?
Fujifilm Diosynth are a long-standing member of the BIA. It allows the UK biotech community to speak with a louder voice than any individual company ever can to the research councils, the government and regulators and ultimately helps ensure that the UK can continue to punch above its weight internationally in biosciences.
Q: What’s next for your organisation?
Over the past 3 years, investments of over $7.4 billion have been made in state-of-the-art US, UK and Denmark facility expansions that support all our service lines, with additional global capacity coming online during the course of 2023-2025. We’ll continue to make investments in growing a skilled workforce, and in enhancing our platform technologies through innovation, and we’ll do it in sustainable, responsible ways. Partners for Life – our core purpose – extends beyond advancing tomorrow’s medicines. It includes protecting our planet.
Q: If you could invite any entrepreneur to dinner, who would it be?
I think having Elon Musk around for dinner would prove a memorable evening! He doesn't strike me as the kind of guy who is going to shy away from telling us how we should do things differently. Anyone got his number?
For more information, visit fujifilmdiosynth.com
Explore a future with FUJIFILM Diosynth Biotechnologies including job openings at their UK locations in Billingham and Darlington by visiting their careers site.
