Sumitomo Chemical has announced plans to build a new plant for APIs and intermediates to come onstream in September 2024 at its Oita works on the southern tip of Honshu. This comes in response to growing demand from the small molecule sector. No financial details were given.

Oita, the company said, “can manufacture a wide variety of APIs and intermediates that require complex chemical reactions and also flexibly scale from development to commercialisation”. It is also compliant with EU, US and Japanese GMP standards.

Kurita has established a new R&D base called the Kurita Innovation Hub (KIH) at Akishima city in Tokyo. Covering about 38,400 m2 and employing 400, this comprises two buildings: the Technology Innovation Centre and the Technical Education Centre.

Following negotiations begun in September 2021, PharmaZell, a German-based supplier of speciality APIs, and Novasep, a CDMO focused on complex small molecules and ADCs, have closed their merger under the majority ownership of Bridgepoint Group. Former PharmaZell CEO Dr Sylke Hassel (pictured) will be CEO, while former Novasep CEO Michel Spagnol has joined the board of directors.

Perstorp plans to roughly double its carboxylic acids capacity by 2024, by adding a second 70,000 tonnes/year facility at its main site in Stenungsund, Sweden. Like the original unit, this will produce acids from C3 to C9 chemistry and will be fully integrated into the company’s oxo production platform.

In collaboration with Johannes Kepler University Linz, Heraeus Precious Metals has developed and applied for a patent on an industrial precious metal catalyst for efficient lignin conversion. This is described as “highly suitable for the conversion of lignin to phenolic components on an industrial scale”.

Japan’s AGC has announced plans for a new, 7,500 m² building at the site of its AGC Pharma Chemicals Europe CDMO operation in Spain. Costing about $100 million, this is scheduled to begin operation in 1H 2024 and will add 30% to the site’s capacity. This comes on top of a 30% increase in capacity announced in April 2020.

The WeylChem Group has officially put a new multi-purpose custom manufacturing plant into operation at Lamotte in the Hauts-de-France region of France. This investment of around €7 million “strengthens our position as a versatile, high-quality partner with reliable European supply chains”, according to company president Uwe Brunk.