Lonza and Teva Collaborate on Biosimilars

Teva (Jerusalem, Israel), the world’s largest generics company, and Lonza (Basel, Switzerland) have formed a joint venture to develop, manufacture, and market biosimilars.

Lonza, one of the largest biopharmaceutical contract manufacturing organizations, is confident that its foray into biosimilars will not interfere with its ongoing work for innovator companies. To protect its customers’ intellectual property, Lonza will not develop biosimilars for any product made by its current customers.

“The joint venture has been very carefully designed so that we cannot work on any biosimilar product for which we do not have the legal or ethical freedom to do so,” said Dominik Werner, a Lonza spokesperson. “Our work for innovator companies remains our core business.”

While developing its strategy for the biosimilars market, Lonza discussed the idea with current customers, and came to the conclusion that they would not be scared off.

“Innovator companies understand the attractiveness of the biosimilars market,” Werner said. “There has been a mindshift, and many of them are also taking steps in this direction.”

Pending regulatory approval of the partnership, activity in the joint venture will begin this quarter, and the companies expect their first product will be approved by 2014.