Novo Nordisk A/S Buys Plant In New Hampshire; Ex-Workers Offered Jobs

Novo Nordisk A/S Buys Plant In New Hampshire; Ex-Workers Offered Jobs Novo Nordisk A/S Buys Plant In New Hampshire; Ex-Workers Offered Jobs

August 27, 2014

By Krystle Vermes, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff

Novo Nordisk A/S , the Danish biopharmaceutical company, announced today that it has purchased a U.S. manufacturing facility. The facility is located in West Lebanon, New Hampshire, and was previously owned by Olympus Biotech.

Novo Nordisk and Olympus Biotech have not revealed the details of the deal.

The facility was initially constructed in 1989, and expanded between 2003 and 2006. Olympus Biotech eventually acquired it in 2011. Novo Nordisk will be using the facility to produce active pharmaceutical ingredients for its expansive portfolio of biopharmaceuticals.

Some of the former employees at the plant have been offered jobs by Novo Nordisk. However, final decisions on staffing will not be made just yet.

Novo Nordisk has more than 90 years of experience in innovative diabetes care. The company employs approximately 40,700 employees in 75 countries. It markets its products in more than 180 countries around the world.

Operating Profit
Earlier in August, Novo Nordisk announced that it had increased operating profit in local currencies by 12 percent within the first six months of 2014 compared to the same period in 2013.

Sales of modern insulin increased by 12 percent, while sales of Victoza leaped by the same margin. Victoza was designed to help patients maintain their blood sugar levels while living with type 2 diabetes.

Novo Nordisk’s product, Tresiba, now represents 21 percent of the basal insulin market measured in monthly value market share in Japan.

"We are satisfied with the financial results achieved in a challenging first half of 2014,” said Lars Rebien Sørensen, CEO of Nova Nordisk. “Tresiba is doing well in key markets and the DEVOTE trial continues to progress ahead of plans. This has enabled us to shorten further the timeline towards the interim analysis and a potential US launch of Tresiba. Furthermore, with the positive opinion for Xultophy from the EU regulatory authorities, we have passed a key milestone in bringing the first insulin and GLP-1 combination product to the market."

Novo Nordisk has made diabetes a primary focus, and it continues to develop products geared toward the treatment of the disease.

Diabetes impacts 29.1 million people in the U.S., and 8.1 of these people are undiagnosed. The disease results in spikes in blood sugar levels over the course of an extended period of time. If diabetes goes undetected, an individual may experience a wide range of symptoms ranging from fatigue to numbness in his or her extremities.

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