Lonza Expands Capsule Mfg. Capacity

Lonza is investing $93 million in its Capsules and Health Ingredients (CHI) Division, a dosage form delivery partner to the biopharma and health nutrition industry. The investment will enable the company to expand its overall production capacity of capsules within CHI's Capsugel portfolio by 30 billion capsules annually, maintaining Lonza's Sigma Series quality standards. Production capacity will be increased across Lonza's global manufacturing and supply chain network and will allow a 15% increase in CHI's current capsule production capacity.

This follows an initial investment initiated in 2019 to increase CHI's capacity by 10 billion capsules. The addition of manufacturing capacity for a further 30 billion capsules will address the high growth across CHI's gelatin, vegetarian, and specialty polymers portfolio as well as the liquid-filled hard capsules sold under the Licaps brand. This investment will be made over two 2020 and 2021, across eight global Lonza manufacturing sites, including Bornem (BE), Colmar (FR), Greenwood (USA), Haryana (IN), Jakarta (ID), Puebla (MX), Sagamihara (JP), and Suzhou, (CN).

"We continue to see strong demand for our products across all markets, as consumers and patients alike take a more active interest in their health.  Therefore, we felt it is critical that we make this commitment to expand the manufacturing capacity of our network, not only addressing supply needs in the near term but also supply availability over the long term."