The European Commission approved Germany’s financial support after assessing the risks of Sanofi stopping insulin API production at the Frankfurt campus.
Sanofi has broken ground on an insulin ingredient manufacturing facility in Frankfurt, Germany, weeks after securing €400 million ($449 million) in support from the German government.
The 36,000-square-meter facility is scheduled to start full production of insulin active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) in 2032, once the plant is fully licensed. Paris-based Sanofi is building the facility at its Frankfurt site, which already handles API manufacturing, filling, device assembly and packaging for about 20 insulin products. Sanofi employs around 4,000 people dedicated to insulin at the site.
While Sanofi committed to building an insulin ingredient production plant in Frankfurt in August 2024, the company was set to close its API manufacturing facility unless the German government provided financial support, the European Commission said last month when approving the aid.
The German government offered Sanofi €400 million ($449 million) to compensate for the costs involved in making the insulin supply chain more resilient. Under European Union rules, Germany needed the Commission’s approval to provide the support.
In return for the funding, Sanofi has committed to building a new insulin factory in Frankfurt by the end of 2032 and ensuring annual production of at least 1.1 metric tons of insulin until the end of 2042. The Commission also required Sanofi to stockpile a metric ton of insulin API until the end of 2042 and to prioritize the European Economic Area (EEA) during insulin shortages.
The approval of the financial support reflects concerns about how the threatened closure of the facility would impact European patients. If Sanofi shuttered the API plant, the EEA would only have one insulin production facility. Novo makes about half the world’s insulin from a site in Denmark.
Without the Sanofi plant, the EU would be more reliant on overseas insulin imports, the Commission said. Officials added that insulin supply shortages have become more frequent as production capacity is diverted to GLP-1 receptor agonists.
Sanofi broke ground on the API facility weeks after the Commission approved the state aid, providing momentum for a construction project first disclosed more than two years ago. Back then, Sanofi outlined plans to invest €1.3 billion ($1.5 billion) and open the insulin API facility by 2029.
The European project has advanced in parallel to Sanofi’s addition of insulin manufacturing capacity in China. The French drugmaker committed €1 billion ($1.1 billion) to build an insulin manufacturing plant in Beijing in December 2024. The company broke ground on the facility in October 2025.
