CDMO PackGene has broken ground on a facility in Houston set to offer customers adeno-associated virus (AAV) vector development and manufacturing services.

The 25,000 square-foot expansion in Houston, Texas – expected to be completed by the end of the year at a cost of around $20 million – will offer PackGene Biotech’s US customer scalable AAV products, along with viral vector development and GMP production capabilities.

The facility will include process and analytical laboratories, cGMP manufacturing cleanrooms and support areas, quality control laboratories, a warehouse, and office space.

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“We are building the capacity of 2 X 500 L bioreactors,” a spokesperson from the contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO) told this publication. “Each bioreactor may produce 10^16-17 vg [viral genomes] depending on the serotype, gene of interest, and production process optimization.”

The site will complement PackGene’s facility in Guangzhou, China, which offers production at up to a 2,000 L scale and provides up to 10¹⁷ vg per batch of AAV.

According to the spokesperson, the firm’s π-Alpha 293 AAV high-yield production platform and π-Omega Plasmid DNA High-Yield Platform produce an AAV yield three to eight times higher than traditional AAV platforms.

“These platforms significantly lower the overall AAV production cost while maintaining high quality.”

The investment was welcomed by the state of Texas and the local business environment. Ann Tanabe, CEO of BioHouston, described PackGene as “a tremendous resource to our Houston community alongside the other members we have here,” at the groundbreaking, adding:

“We do healthcare delivery all so well in Houston: we have the greatest academic research institutions; we have a vibrant early-stage entrepreneur community at TMC innovation; now we have manufacturing, which is a huge piece of the overall delivery system for patients.”