A plant is being built in Moscow to produce the Sputnik V vaccine, the first Russian vaccine against COVID-19. “We created production buildings within a month and handed them over for the installation of equipment and the creation of "clean" rooms. People work 24/7. About 70 kilometers of various communications have been laid. Gas, water, electricity were supplied, a steam-gas boiler house was built. Equipment installation is in full swing now”, pointed out Sergey Sobyanin, the Mayor of Moscow during his visit to the enterprise. The plant for the production of the Sputnik V vaccine is a joint project of the Moscow Government and one of the leaders of the Russian pharmaceutical market - R-Pharm with $137 m to be invested in it. “It will be one of the largest venues in Russia. I hope that the plant will be launched within a few weeks”, said the Mayor of Moscow. The Moscow Government proposed one the best production sites in the capital to locate the plant - SEZ Technopolis Moscow in Pechatniki (Volgogradskiy prospect, 42, building 5). In the shortest possible time, the city services provided the manufacturing buildings with power facilities and other necessary communication lines. The tenants who previously occupied part of the premises of the future plant were relocated. "Clean" rooms were installed. The equipment is purchased by the R-Pharm company. “The first industrial site was created in Zelenograd, together with the Gamaleya National Research Center and Biopharm, which produces small volumes of vaccine but is now driving up. And now one of the largest vaccine production sites is being created here, in Technopolis Moscow, together with the R-Pharm company”, revealed Sergey Sobyanin. The plant area will be 27 thousand m?. 70 percent will be occupied by "clean" rooms. The company will create about 500 jobs. Manufacturers estimate that at full capacity, the plant will produce up to 10 million doses of vaccine per month. The process will include four stages. The first one will engage the cultivation of cells and viral particles, the second - filtration, isolation (chromatography) of the vaccine substance, the third - cleaning, filling, freeze drying, and at the fourth - the secondary packaging of bottles in a pack. “This is an unprecedented facility, both in terms of the timing of its deployment and in terms of its scale. Indeed, more than 400 tons of equipment have already arrived from Germany, France, China. The production of the Russian vaccine will allow all of us - the economy, citizens - to feel confident and respond to the challenge that we are all facing, to preserve the maximum safety of Russian citizens, including, of course, Muscovites”, said Alexey Repik, the Chairman of the Board of Directors at R-Pharm. The production now employs almost 1.5 thousand people 24/7. Before the New Year, they plan to establish all the necessary technological processes there. Alexey Repik expressed confidence that in two or three weeks it will be a working technological production, which has no analogues in Russia yet. “The Russian pharmaceutical industry, in particular the R-Pharm company, has already launched a large-scale production of drugs for the treatment of coronavirus infection. And Moscow healthcare is one of the pioneers among the most advanced specialists who are doing everything to minimize the damage to citizens, to minimize the severity of the disease. And in this part the first step has been taken. But without a vaccine, without creating a shield against coronavirus, we will not be able to return to normal life and will have to live under these restrictions”, he pointed out. According to Sergey Sobyanin, Moscow is one of the largest pharmaceutical sites in the country. “We produce about 20 percent of pharmaceutical products. And during the pandemic, on behalf of the President and the Government of Russia, we began to increase the production of drugs related to the treatment of COVID-19 and personal protective means. And today in these areas Moscow is also one of the leaders", said the Mayor of Moscow. The most modern high-tech equipment was purchased for the plant, including 156 wave bioreactors (with a total output of 24 thousand liters of culture per month), 11 bioreactors with axial mixing (with a total output of 72 thousand liters of culture per month), a robotic packaging line. There will also be two high-speed filling lines: non-freezing (plus two to eight degrees during storage) with freeze dryers with a capacity of 2.7 million doses per month, as well as freezing (minus 18-25 degrees during storage) with a capacity of 8.1 million doses per month at full load of the reactors. As of December 10, all engineering systems and communications necessary to start production have been installed. Now the 800 m? refrigeration center and the installation of equipment are being completed, “clean” rooms assembled as well as ventilation and air conditioning systems. The first packages of the Sputnik V vaccine are supposed be produced at this plant in January 2021. The owner of the plant, R-Pharm, is one of the leaders of the Russian pharmaceutical market. It mainly makes finished dosage forms, pharmaceutical substances, researches and develops drugs and technologies. It deals with oncological, hematological, cardiological, immunological, antibacterial, antiviral drugs, as well as drugs that are used in organ transplantation, treatment of multiple sclerosis and diabetes mellitus. The Moscow Healthcare Department has been cooperating with R-Pharm since 2008. The enterprise supplies the city with medicines necessary for the treatment of oncological, endocrine, gynecological, cardiological diseases, as well as those used in psycho-neurological practice. Based on the results of the auction held this year, the Department of Healthcare entered into government contracts with R-Pharm for the supply of drugs for 50 international non-proprietary names (INN). Their total amount is more than $68.5 m. About 60 percent of these drugs are vital (33 INN each). Thus, over 66 thousand people, including social welfare beneficiaries, patients of hospitals and city clinics, received their medicines. In 2018, the Moscow Government signed an offset contract with R-Opra LLC, which is part of the R-Pharm group of companies, for the supply of 56 drugs (31 of which are international non-proprietary names) for the treatment and prevention of cancer, cardiological, endocrine and other diseases. More than 50 percent of these drugs are not produced in Russia. At least three drugs will be provided with a full production cycle, including the release of a pharmaceutical substance. The contract is signed for 10 years, four years of which are allocated for the creation of production. The investor plans to open 12 production lines, having invested at least $79.4 m in this project. The contract cost (the volume of purchases for city needs) amounted to $250 m. The production will be set up at the Alabushevo site of SEZ Technopolis Moscow. ---------------------- Press service of the SEZ "Technopolis Moscow" Phone: +7 916 516-15-46 Mail: pr@technomoscow.ru [ mailto:pr@technomoscow.ru ] Subscribe to the SEZ "Technopolis Moscow" in social networks, follow the main news of the SEZ in telegram-channel [ https://t.me/technopolismoscow ] and receive all the most important news delivered to your mail in our weekly newsletter [ http://events.technomoscow.ru/subscribe/?utm_source=site_technomoscow ] .
