Novo Nordisk A/S Named Inaugural Facility Of The Year Award Winner

Danish pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk A/S was named the first Facility of the Year Award winner during today's plenary session of the INTERPHEX 2005 Conference and Exhibition at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York City. Novo Nordisk was chosen for its new NovoSeven(R) pharmaceutical manufacturing facility in Hillerod, Denmark, winning out over a global field of 28 entries representing 12 countries. An international judging panel of experts from the pharmaceutical design, construction, and manufacturing sectors reviewed all entries and selected Novo Nordisk from among four other finalists: Alkermes, Inc. of Cambridge, Massachusetts; Apotex, Inc. of Toronto, Ontario, Canada; Kowa Company, Ltd. of Nagoya, Japan; and Lundbeck, Ltd. of the United Kingdom.

"The new NovoSeven site is proof positive of the growing worldwide status of facility design and engineering," said Bob Best, President and CEO of ISPE. "Facilities are no longer taking a 'back seat' to research and development, but are now being considered an essential and strategic component of the overall development process for new pharmaceutical products."

Dedicated to production of Novo Nordisk's lifesaving NovoSeven(R) hemophilia drug, the award-winning plant is an integrated facility for mammalian cell fermentation, recovery, and purification. Based on groundbreaking modular design and engineering, the new plant is Novo Nordisk's response to two key business requirements: to rapidly expand capacity to meet a growing demand for NovoSeven, and to accommodate unknown future demand and any new indications for the drug that may be approved. The sleek new 150,000-square-foot facility offers strong proof of the modular concept for the project's design, engineering, and construction partner, Novo Nordisk Engineering (NNE). By going modular, NNE was able to hand the project off to Novo Nordisk after a fast-tracked 18 months -- and the modular design will enable easy expansion as product demand increases into the future.

"Novo Nordisk is an outstanding example of the high-quality, creative approaches pharmaceutical companies are taking to address key business challenges," said Peter Bigelow, chairman of the Facility of the Year judging panel. "The NovoSeven facility deserves this recognition for several reasons: creative design within a super fast-track timeline for project execution, application of modular engineering for greater control and flexibility, and dramatic and pleasing architectural features throughout the facility."

Construction of the NovoSeven Facility was performed by NNE and MT Hojgaard, with commissioning and validation services performed by NNE. Major equipment suppliers include: Millipore, BBi, Christ, Semcon, Bravida, and Emerson Process Management.