Seattle Genetics paid $43.3 million to purchase Bristol-Myers Squibb’s (BMS) pharmaceutical manufacturing facility in Bothell, WA. The facility, known as the Monte Villa Parkway Research Center, is a 51,000 square foot state-of-the art manufacturing and laboratory space built in 2014. Seattle Genetics plans to utilize the facility primarily for antibody production for current and future pipeline programs. As part of the transaction, the company intends to offer employment to the manufacturing facility’s current employees. The transaction is expected to close in the second half of 2017.

“This turnkey manufacturing facility provides the capability, capacity and skilled workforce needed to support our expanding antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) and immuno-oncology pipeline, and complements our existing outsourced manufacturing model,” said Vaughn Himes, chief technical officer, Seattle Genetics. “In addition, its location near our corporate headquarters will provide operational synergies with our current technical operations team and underscores our strategy for continued growth in Washington state.”

Seattle Genetics is a biotechnology company that develops and commercializes novel antibody-based therapies for the treatment of cancer. The company’s ADC technology harnesses the targeting ability of antibodies to deliver cell-killing agents directly to cancer cells. Adcetris (brentuximab vedotin), the company’s lead product, in collaboration with Takeda, is the first in a new class of ADCs commercially available globally in 67 countries for relapsed classical Hodgkin lymphoma and relapsed systemic anaplastic large cell lymphoma (sALCL). The company is also advancing enfortumab vedotin, an ADC for metastatic urothelial cancer, in a planned pivotal trial in collaboration with Astellas.

Headquartered in Bothell, Seattle Genetics has a strong pipeline of innovative therapies for blood-related cancers and solid tumors designed to address significant unmet medical needs and improve treatment outcomes for patients. The company has collaborations for its proprietary ADC technology with a number of companies including AbbVie, Astellas, Bayer, Celldex, Genentech, GlaxoSmithKline and Pfizer.