Alex Philippidis Senior News Editor Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News

Manufacturing Grows Along with the Development of Biologics

The market for bioprocess technology is growing with the rise and development of biologics: A study last year by Research and Markets projected that market to zoom from $39.3 billion in 2016 to $71.03 billion by 2021, based on a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 12.4% over the five-year period.

The report listed as reasons overall biopharma industry growth, increases in R&D spending, rising demand for vaccine production, and technological advancements.

Below is a list of 15 top bioprocessing companies, ranked by revenue—either companywide for companies entirely focused on the segment, or for business segments focused on biologics manufacturing in the case of companies with broader operations. Each company is listed by name, 2017 revenues, and a short explanation of where the revenues were derived.

 

#15. Solesis Medical (Fenner PLC)

2017 revenues: £59 million ($82.088 million)

Figure includes total medical revenue revenues for the year ending August 31, 2017. Nearly all of that (£55 million) was generated by Fenner’s Solesis Medical unit, which includes Charter Medical (single-use products for blood management, bio-processing and cell therapy) as well as Secant Group (biomedical textile components and biomaterials). Fenner does not disclose how much of its revenue relates to bioprocessing.

#14. Repligen

2016-2017 revenues: $125.015 million

Figure combines $99.516 million reported for the first three quarters of 2017 with $25.499 million reported for Q4 2016. The company at deadline had not announced a date for reporting full-year 2017 results.  During a presentation at the J.P. Morgan 36th Annual Healthcare Conference on January 9, Repligen President and CEO Tony J. Hunt said 2017 revenues would range between $139 million and $142 million. 

#13. Eppendorf

2017 revenues: €673.9 million ($834.727 million)

Figure includes the first half of 2017 and second half of 2016; the company at deadline had not announced a date for reporting full-year 2017 results. Last year the company reported 2016 results on April 28. “We are assuming that our business will continue to develop positively overall for the whole year 2017 and we expect growth to be higher than the industry average,” Thomas Bachmann, Eppendorf’s president & CEO, said August 11 in a statement.

#12. Corning

2017 revenues: $879 million

Figure consists of company’s Life Sciences segment, whose products “include general labware and equipment, as well as specialty surfaces, media, and reagents that are used for cell culture research, bioprocessing, genomics, drug discovery, microbiology, and chemistry 2018.” Corning has projected that Life Sciences sales are expected to grow by a mid-single-digit percentage.

#11. Boehringer Ingelheim

2016 revenues: €776 million ($951.1 million)

Boehringer Ingelheim reports revenues annually; the company at deadline had not announced a date for reporting full-year 2017 results. Last year the company reported 2016 results on April 5. The 2016 figure consists of revenues from two Boehringer Ingelheim businesses: Biopharmaceutical contract manufacturing, €613 million ($751.3 million) and “Industrial Customers,” consisting of third-party businesses in pharmaceutical and chemical production and sales of pharma chemicals, €163 million ($199.8 million).

#10. Asahi Kasei Medical (Asahi Kasei)

2017 revenues: ¥134.8 billion ($1.238 billion)

Figure combines revenues for the first three quarters of 2017 (¥103 billion), with fourth-quarter 2016 revenues (¥31.8 billion) for Asahi Kasei Medical, the segment of Asahi Kasei that includes “products for the manufacturing process of biopharmaceuticals and other new drugs” as well as drugs and blood purification devices for chronic and acute renal failure. The company reported October–December 2017 results on February 7.

#9. Sartorius Stedim Biotech

2017 revenues: €1.081 billion ($1.328 billion) 
 
Figure reflects preliminary results for 2017. The company said January 31 its overall 4.1% increase in sales revenue was primarily driven by double-digit growth in Asia due to large equipment projects. Bioprocessing growth also fueled a 13.7% jump in order intake by parent Sartorius Group: “Demand in its bioprocess business picked up significantly, especially in the second half,” the Group stated on January 31. 

#8. Thermo Fisher Scientific

2017 revenues: Approximately $1.5 billion
 
Figure reflects revenue from “production” operations, as disclosed by the company in its 2017 Analyst Meeting, held May 17, 2017. Thermo Fisher included cell culture media, single-use technologies, next-generation continuous bioprocess solutions, consumables, equipment, and instruments for biopharma quality control. 

#7. CPC (Colder Products Co.)

2017 revenues: $2.251 billion 
 
Figure includes revenues for parent company Dover’s Fluids business unit, which includes CPC and is “pursuing further growth in the retail fueling, hygienic and pharma and polymers/plastics markets.” Dover does not break out revenue for specific operations within Fluids, though a spokesman told GEN that bioprocessing was “a very small number as a percent of Dover.” 

#6. Lonza – Pharma & Biotech

2017 revenues: CHF 2.124 billion ($2.272 billion)
 
Lonza’s Pharma & Biotech business consists of five units: Mammalian Manufacturing, Chemical and Microbial Manufacturing, Clinical Development and Licensing, Emerging Technologies, and Bioscience Solutions. The company does not break out revenues for bioprocessing or other components of Pharma & Biotech. 

#5. Catalent

2017 revenues: $2.300 billion 
 
Figure includes revenues from the third and fourth quarters of Catalent’s 2017 fiscal year (January–June 2017) and the first and second quarters of the company’s 2018 fiscal year (July–December 2017). Catalent grew late last year when it acquired Cook Pharmica for $950 million, in a deal completed October 24, 2017.

#4. Fujifilm Healthcare (Fujifilm Holdings)

2017 revenues: ¥432.5 billion ($3.964 billion) 
 
Figures are for the Healthcare business of Fujifilm’s Information Solutions segment, which develops businesses in medical systems, pharmaceuticals, regenerative medicine, and life sciences. Healthcare also includes Fujifilm Diosynth Biotechnologies, a contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO) focused on the development and manufacture of recombinant biopharmaceuticals and 
advanced therapies. Fujifilm reports earnings on a fiscal year that begins April 1 and ends March 31.

#3. GE Healthcare (General Electric)

2017 revenues: $5 billion 
 
Figure consists of GE Healthcare’s Life Sciences business, which includes bioprocessing operations, whose individual revenue the company no longer discloses. In 2015, GE Healthcare reported revenue from bioprocessing operations of $1.5 billion.During 2017, bioprocess orders rose 12% year-over-year, helping propel an overall 9% rise in orders reported by the life sciences unit. 

#2. Danaher Life Sciences (Danaher)

2017 revenues: $5.710 billion
 
Figure includes revenues from Danaher’s life sciences platform, which consists of Beckman Coulter Life Sciences, SCIEX, Molecular Devices, Pall, and Leica Microsystems. Pall, a global provider of filtration, separation, and purification systems, was acquired by Danaher in 2015 for $13.8 billion. 

#1. MilliporeSigma (Merck KGaA)

2017 revenue: €5.658 billion ($7.012 billion)
 
Figure includes revenues for the first three quarters of 2017 and the fourth quarter of 2016; Merck KGaA is scheduled to report fourth-quarter and full-year 2017 results on March 8. MilliporeSigma is the name of Merck KGaA’s life science business in the U.S. and Canada, and was formed when Merck KGaA acquired Sigma-Aldrich for $17 billion, in a deal completed in 2015. Sigma-Aldrich was combined with Merck KGaA’s EMD Millipore unit. 
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