Janssen’s activities in Belgium have a wide reach: with all pharmaceutical activities present, from R&D to supply chain and commercial to manufacturing, this innovation powerhouse hosts over 5000 employees including 2300 researchers. Every year, it invests €1.5 billion in research & development towards fulfilling the Janssen Promise: to create a future where disease is a thing of the past.
Janssen lab technicians in Beerse
Janssen is known for its research and innovative science in pharmaceuticals, particularly in Neurosciences, Oncology, Infectious Diseases & Vaccines, Immunology, Cardiovascular & Metabolic Diseases and Pulmonary Hypertension. Their work to create a sustainable healthcare system with the patient at the heart of new developments is divided across six Belgian locations.
Janssen’s ‘high-volume’ production plant in Beerse, near Antwerp, is a center of excellence for certain technologies, such as products in liquid and semi-solid form, transdermal products and sterile products. A new €21 million investment is revolutionizing the production line of pharmaceuticals, from traditionally slow ‘batch manufacturing’ to a more efficient and more harmonized ‘continuous manufacturing.’ Meanwhile, the chemical production site in Geel produces 60% of the total production capacity of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) within Johnson & Johnson worldwide.
Inside Janssen’s chemical production site in Geel
The Beerse site is also busy with Project LION, a new top lab that was made possible by a €42.8 million investment. It stands for Labs-In-One-Network and comprises the construction of a new lab for the Small Molecule Analytical Development & Pharmaceutical Sciences departments. Stef Heylen, Managing Director of Janssen in Belgium, explains:
This investment is very good news and an important step for the future of our campus. Not only does this new lab offer a great future for the research department, it also strengthens the position of the production departments. The fact that we are able to invest such a large amount here in Beerse also shows the strength of, and the belief in, our campus.
Stef Heylen, Managing Director of Janssen in Belgium
The new lab will be fully operational in 2020.
A further project of Johnson & Johnson is the JLABS, an incubator to nurture early-stage companies actively pursuing research – the first of the European JLABS was set up in Belgium. The idea comes from Johnson & Johnson’s belief that no organization can achieve everything internally.
Janssen R&D lab technicians
