Cytiva Provides Arranta Bio with Single-Use Manufacturing Platform for mRNA Products

Cytiva announced on Jan. 25, 2022 that it will provide its FlexFactory single-use manufacturing platform to Arranta Bio, a contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO), for the manufacture of messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccines.

Arranta is adding $10 million to its $100 million investment in its new Watertown, Mass., facility. The additional $10 million will be used to open a dedicated space for mRNA manufacturing, lipid nanoparticle (LNP) formulation, and drug product filling. With the expansion at the Watertown facility, Arranta will have the capability to offer an end-to-end platform for current good manufacturing practice (CGMP) manufacturing of mRNA products. The new space, scheduled to open within six months, will include in-vitro transcription, mRNA purification, LNP formulation, and aseptic filling. The first round of GMP production is expected in the 2022 third quarter.

“Arranta is offering mRNA developers something unique: an integrated suite of complementary services from a single provider. Cytiva’s solutions provide us with the flexibility and modularity to offer our customers tailored manufacturing. With the addition of Cytiva’s robotic aseptic filling solutions, we are truly an end-to-end, single point of contact CDMO, reducing overall complexity, cost, and time to the product innovator,”said Mark Bamforth, executive chair and CEO of Arranta, in a company press release.

Cytiva had acquired the aseptic business from Canada-based Vanrx in early 2021, which completed its biomanufacturing workflow and enables the company to offer solutions from “idea to injection.”

“Our agreement with Arranta marks the first time our full range of solutions will be used in the manufacturing of mRNA. We’ve developed our platform to work for a multitude of modalities beyond the traditional mAbs [monoclonal antibodies], such as cell and gene therapies, plasmid DNA, and now, mRNA. It’s exciting to support this next generation of therapies that will benefit patients globally and deliver on our company mission to advance and accelerate therapeutics,” said Olivier Loeillot, vice-president of Bioprocess at Cytiva, in the press release.

Source: Cytiva