Lentivi­ral vec­tor ramp-up: J&J and Leg­end to in­vest $500M in New Jer­sey man­u­fac­tur­ing to sup­port Carvyk­ti

In re­sponse to a ques­tion on man­u­fac­tur­ing scale at Leg­end Biotech’s R&D day yes­ter­day, the com­pa­ny’s top ex­ec said its part­ner­ship with John­son & John­son will be dou­bling its in­vest­ment in its New Jer­sey man­u­fac­tur­ing cen­ter and will be in­vest­ing a to­tal of $500 mil­lion.

With an eye on their BC­MA-di­rect­ed CAR-T ther­a­py Carvyk­ti (cil­ta-cel), ap­proved in Feb­ru­ary as a fifth-line treat­ment for mul­ti­ple myelo­ma, Leg­end CEO Ying Huang said that the ramp-up in pro­duc­tion and the de­ci­sion to man­u­fac­ture its own lentivi­ral vec­tors — cur­rent­ly in short­age world­wide — means they won’t have to deal with that short­age.

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