Cellipont Bioservices, a contract development and manufacturing organisation (CDMO) based in the US, developed a commercial-ready facility for manufacturing cell therapies and gene-modified cell therapies in Houston, Texas, US.
Announced in August 2022, construction work on the facility started in November of the same year.
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The facility was inaugurated in March 2024, and the company relocated its headquarters from San Diego, California, to the new location.
Location
Cellipont’s facility is located at 9501 Lakeside Boulevard in Research Forest Lakeside (RFL) in The Woodlands, Houston.
The site was bought from Vitrian, a fully integrated biomanufacturing and real estate company, by JLL Capital Markets, a professional services company that specialises in real estate and investment management, on behalf of Cellipont in August 2022.
NAI Partners represented Cellipont in the subsequent lease negotiations with Vitrian for the property.
RFL is a mixed-use site that houses a wide range of tenants, including companies in the financial services, logistics, chemicals, oil and gas exploration, liquid natural gas shipping, and integrated energy sectors.
The site offers access to all the amenities available in The Woodlands such as Market Street, The Woodlands Mall, and The Woodlands Waterway Marriott Hotel and Convention Center. It is also less than a five-minute drive from the I-45 highway in Texas.
In addition, RFL is well-positioned near Houston to serve clients across the whole of North America, with access to two major airports and a strong local workforce.
Cellipont Bioservices’ manufacturing facility details
The state-of-the-art manufacturing facility has been built on a 76,000ft2 site in a phased manner.
The facility includes seven Grade B clean rooms, quality control laboratories, temperature-controlled storage, a warehouse, segregated shipping bays and administrative offices.
Equipped with the latest technology, the facility features process development, assay development and testing capabilities.
It has been designed to offer state-of-the-art facilities and capabilities to Cellipont’s clients as their programmes move towards commercialisation.
The facility’s good manufacturing practice (GMP) operations help deliver rapid and versatile solutions, meeting the unique requirements of clients and products.
Financing details
Cellipont received a strategic debt investment from OrbiMed, a healthcare investment company, to fully finance the development of the manufacturing facility in March 2023.
Contractors involved in the project
LEAD Construction, a general contractor specialising in commercial, industrial and retail projects, has provided general contracting services for the project.
Cell therapy design/build/qualification specialist cGMPnow also partnered for the project.
Inventure, a local architecture and planning company, also supported the design and construction of the project.
Other contractors involved in the project include H2B Engineering, an engineering services provider, and Telios, a civil and structural engineering services provider.
Marketing commentary on Cellipont Bioservices
Performance Cell Manufacturing, a cell therapy CDMO, was acquired by Great Point Partners, a private equity company, and renamed Cellipont Bioservices in January 2022.
Cellipont has more than 15 years of experience in the development and small-to-large batch manufacturing of cell therapies.
The company provides clinical GMP manufacturing services, for which it maintains several suites in a range of sizes, as well as a wide array of equipment.
It offers autologous and allogeneic manufacturing processes, which involve the isolation and purification of primary cells, the creation of master and working cell banks, and experience with a wide range of tissue and cell types.
Cellipont’s 26,000ft2 development and manufacturing facility in Poway, San Diego, features six ISO 7 manufacturing suites, fill/finish capabilities, and a wide selection of equipment for efficient and robust clinical manufacturing.
It can also deploy a range of technology platforms in the manufacturing facility such as Lovo, Prodigy and Xuri when required.
The company is also expanding its San Diego facility to increase its capacity for process development and Phase I/II programmes to support growth.
