Moderna invests $140M to onshore mRNA manufacturing

Moderna announced that it will onshore drug product manufacturing of its mRNA medicines to its Moderna Technology Center (MTC) in Norwood, Massachusetts as part of a $140 million investment to expand its U.S. manufacturing capabilities and create hundreds of biomanufacturing jobs domestically.

Moderna said in a release that it will now operate “full end-to-end manufacturing for its mRNA medicines in the U.S.,” which is designed to support both commercial and clinical supply and reinforce its commitment to domestic mRNA production for vaccines and therapeutics.

“By onshoring Drug Product manufacturing to our campus in Norwood, Massachusetts, we have completed the full manufacturing loop under one roof in the U.S.,” Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel said in a statement. “As an American company committed to building and producing in America, we are proud to strengthen our domestic footprint while bringing meaningful new jobs to the community.”

Construction at MTC for the new drug product manufacturing capability has already started and is targeted to be completed by 2027. Moderna’s mRNA platform aims to drive potential biomedical breakthroughs across infectious diseases, cancer, rare diseases and autoimmune disorders, the company said in the announcement.

In September, Moderna opened its Moderna Innovation and Technology Centre at the Harwell Science and Innovation Campus in Oxfordshire, U.K., which manufactures British-made mRNA respiratory vaccines to support seasonal programs for the U.K.’s National Health Service. The site has capacity to produce about 100 million mRNA vaccine doses per year and can be scaled to roughly 250 million doses in the event of a pandemic.

In July, the company completed an R&D and manufacturing facility at Shonan Health Innovation Park in Fujisawa, Japan, but paused a previously planned domestic mRNA drug-substance manufacturing project in the region due to shifting global market conditions.