West Pharmaceutical Services opens facility near Chennai

West Pharmaceutical Services has opened its manufacturing facility in Sri City Special Economic Zone (SEZ) near Chennai, where the company will expand its growing primary packaging for injectable medicines business. The facility will produce seals used in primary packaging of injectable medicines.

In June 2012, West signed a 99-year lease on 72,800 square metres (approximately 783,600 square feet) of land in Sri City. It offers the advantages of a metropolitan location and was selected primarily on the suitability of land, availability of utilities, labour suitability, logistics and quality of life. Construction began in August 2012 on 15,300 square metre (approximately 164,700 square feet). There are future plans to expand production at the site to include West’s elastomer component business.

“West is experiencing an exciting period of growth and business expansion in Asia and we are proud to open our first facility in India,” said Donald E Morel, Jr, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, West Pharmaceutical Services.

“This investment is important to our strategy of partnering with customers in India and Asia Pacific region in order to help them provide medicines to patients more efficiently, reliably and safely,” said Warwick Bedwell, President, Pharmaceutical Packaging Systems, Asia Pacific Region. He added, “With the facility complete, we anticipate a reduction in lead times for supply to our customers in India. By leveraging our global sourcing activities and process engineering expertise, we expect to be able to carefully manage the overall costs of production.”

West’s presence in the Asia Pacific market includes a plant in Singapore, two plants in Qingpu, China and sales offices in Australia, China, India and Singapore. West also owns 25 per cent of Daikyo Seiko, Tokyo, Japan. Daikyo Seiko, founded in 1954, is a leader in the fields of pharmaceutical packaging and medical device components. The West/Daikyo relationship was formed in 1973 and includes joint marketing agreements and technology transfer and licensing agreements.

EP News Bureau – Chennai