Novartis is wasting little time sketching out the radiopharmaceutical details of its $23 billion U.S. investment push. Shortly after announcing a new manufacturing facility for the class of cancer meds in Florida, the pharma giant is revealing its intention to build another site in Texas.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The forthcoming 46,000-square-foot radioligand therapy (RLT) production plant will be set up<\/a> in Denton, Texas\u2014part of the greater Dallas-Fort Worth area\u2014and becomes the fifth existing or planned radiopharmaceutical manufacturing site in Novartis\u2019 U.S. network, the company said in a Feb. 25 release.\u00a0<\/p>\n Construction is slated to kick off this year, with the site expected to come online in 2028, Novartis said.\u00a0<\/p>\n The plant will generate jobs in fields like bioengineering, advanced manufacturing, quality and operations, although Novartis did not specify how many new hires it has planned.\u00a0<\/p>\n As it stands, Novartis boasts two approved RLTs\u2014also known as radiopharmaceuticals\u2014in Lutathera and Pluvicto, which are approved by the FDA to treat neuroendocrine tumors and prostate cancer, respectively. Radiopharmaceuticals target cancer cells with a radioactive drug, and they have become an increasingly popular oncology development focus, though the overall number of RLTs approved in the U.S. remains slim.\u00a0<\/p>\n Novartis did not name-drop Lutathera and Pluvicto directly in its announcement, though the company did note that the Denton facility will serve patients in the southern U.S. and \u201cadd network capacity as RLT expands into earlier treatment lines and additional tumor types.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cRLT has the potential to revolutionize cancer care,\u201d Vas Narasimhan, M.D., Novartis\u2019 CEO, said in a statement. \u201cThe addition of our fifth RLT manufacturing site in the US strengthens our ability to meet growing demand, building the capabilities needed to deliver these next-generation treatments with the speed and precision they require.\u201d<\/p>\n The new Texas RLT plant will join four others across New Jersey, Indiana, California and, most recently, Florida.\u00a0<\/p>\n Back in early January, the company laid out<\/a> blueprints on a 35,000-square-foot plant for RLT production in Winter Park, Florida, which it expects to come online by 2029.\u00a0<\/p>\n