Source: Taipei Times by Kao Shih-ching

PharmaEssentia Corp (藥華醫藥), which provides drugs for a rare type of blood cancer, yesterday broke ground for a new factory in Hsinchu, which is scheduled to be completed in 2025.

The plant is expected to boost the company’s annual production value by NT$40 billion (US$1.25 billion), executives from the firm said at the groundbreaking ceremony.

The NT$5.1 billion plant is to comprise 50,000m2 to manufacture the polycythemia vera (PV) drug Ropeginterferon alfa-2b, also known as Ropeg.

PV is a rare blood cancer that causes bone marrow to produce excessive red blood cells and slows blood flow.

Approved by the US Food and Drug Administration in November last year, Ropeg is PharmaEassential’s most significant product, and helped boost the firm’s revenue to NT$2.04 billion in the first nine months, six times higher than a year earlier, the company said.

“Ropeg has gained approval in Taiwan, the EU, Switzerland, Israel, South Korea and the US. Now we are targeting Japan and China as the drug’s next markets,” PharmaEssentia chairwoman Teng Ching-leou (詹青柳) said at the ceremony.

The company is conducting a phase 3 clinical trial to determine whether Ropeg can also treat essential thrombocythemia, an uncommon disorder in which bone marrow produces too many platelets, Teng said.

PharmaEssentia would apply for market approval worldwide if the trial proves successful, she added.

The construction of the new plant in Hsinchu County’s Jhubei City (竹北) is expected to be finished in the first quarter of 2025, and enter mass production later that year after testing and an inspection by the US Food and Drug Administration, the company said.

PharmaEssentia also plans to partner with National Taiwan University Hospital’s branch in Hsinchu to develop cell therapy, the company added.

The company’s third-quarter revenue totaled NT$811 million, up 781 percent from a year earlier, while sales of Ropeg in the US continued to grow at a double-digit pace, it said.