Cytiva opens Asia diagnostics advanced application centre

Published: 31-Mar-2021

The lab is part of Cytiva’s global expansion plans, including an investment of $500 m across five years to raise manufacturing capacity, announced in September 2020

Cytiva is opening a design lab in Tonglu, the company’s manufacturing site located close to Shanghai in East China. Here, diagnostics companies can access Cytiva’s diagnostic services without having to travel overseas to its Germany lab. Developing a lateral flow diagnostic is a complex process. By offering laboratory infrastructure, technical expertise, and consultation, the company aims to help developers overcome technical hurdles and be ready to apply for regulatory approval.

“In the last year, China has been extremely active. They accelerated the development of their COVID-19 tests and we see a lot of demand for diagnostic components,” says Emmanuel Abate, VP Genomics and Cellular Research at Cytiva.

The lab is part of Cytiva’s global expansion plans, including an investment of $500 m across five years to raise manufacturing capacity, announced in September 2020.

Cytiva aims to bring expertise in areas such as material science, biochemistry, and virology, as well as manufacturing for scale-up, under the same roof. The company will offer raw material research and advice, scale-up support and access to a lab fitted with sample preparation equipment, bench-top centrifuges and electronic scanning microscopes.

“We have been manufacturing filtration products in Tonglu for many years and are now pleased to apply our assay design expertise to help local companies with their diagnostics projects. The expectations of this new lab are high and there are already a dozen design-in projects in this year’s pipeline.” said Eric Wu, Plant Manager for the Tonglu site.

Powered by 200 associates, the site is ISO-accredited with digital and automation technologies. The design lab will strengthen Cytiva’s commitment to the Tonglu area, an economic development zone.

“We have been supporting the diagnostic industry for over 30 years', helping customers to optimize assays,” said Emmanuel Abate. “With lots of new companies entering the space to meet the challenges of COVID-19 now is the right time to establish a dedicated space to support our customers in Asia to reach their diagnostics development goals.”

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