Lonza looks to grow specialized modalities unit amid industry challenges

Lonza implemented a new operating model in 2025 aimed at simplifying and streamlining its organizational structure. Under its One Lonza strategy, the Swiss-headquartered company has positioned itself as a pure-play contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO) through three aligned business platforms: advanced synthesis, integrated biologics, and specialized modalities.

However, Lonza’s specialized modalities unit — which includes bioscience products/services, cell and gene therapies, microbial processes, and mRNA/lipid nanoparticle (LNP) therapeutics — struggled last year.

While the advanced synthesis and integrated biologics businesses drove 2025 constant exchange rate (CER) sales growth of 22.4% and 32.2%, respectively, Lonza’s specialized modalities CER sales declined 3% last year versus 2024. In the first half of 2025, specialized modalities “started weak” but Lonza said the business showed “improving trends” and returned to growth in the second half of last year, especially in microbial.

Although cell and gene remained “subdued” in the second half of 2025, Lonza reported that bioscience saw “robust CER sales growth throughout the year.” During a Jan. 28, 2026 earnings call with analysts, CFO Philippe Deecke described specialized modalities as the “soft point” in Lonza’s performance last year, particularly its cell and gene business whose pipeline variability and complex manufacturing weighed on asset utilization. 

Deecke told analysts that in 2025 Lonza experienced “some operational challenges” in one of its cell and gene sites which is “being resolved” and the business will “continue in a more normal fashion in 2026.” He noted that all Lonza’s cell and gene sites have a commercial product, which is “helping to stabilize” the utilization of these facilities.

CEO Wolfgang Wienand added that Lonza is one of the few CDMOs with five commercial assets in its global cell and gene network. “Each of our manufacturing sites now has one commercial asset,” according to Wienand.

While Lonza saw soft operational performance from its cell and gene business last year, the company is “looking forward to a much better year in 2026,” Deecke said. “On the microbial side, where we experienced a phasing towards the end of 2025 into 2026, also here, a better 2026 is expected.”

Wienand called out Lonza’s specialized modalities business for its strategic importance to the company, with the expectation it will be a significant future growth driver and a contributor to profitability. However, he said the segment is “still suffering” as its business portfolio is “much smaller than for the other modalities, and as a consequence of that, also more volatile.”

Last month, Lonza took steps to streamline its specialized modalities portfolio with divestitures of two assets: the Personalized Medicines cell and gene therapy business — including its Cocoon cell therapy platform — to Octane Medical Group, and its MODA biosciences software platform to StarLIMS.

Priming the ‘Lonza Engine’ 

Thomas Fellner, Lonza’s vice president and head of commercial development for specialized modalities, told Pharma Manufacturing that 2025 was a strategically important year for the CDMO given its reorganization.

“It was the start of the specialized modalities as a platform,” Fellner said, as well as the beginning of the advanced synthesis and integrated biologic business platforms under the new One Lonza operating model centered around the “Lonza Engine” — a framework of five core components: high-performance teams, scientific and digital capabilities, strong customer partnerships, execution excellence, and plug-and-play integration.

The Lonza Engine drives collaboration within specialized modalities — including cell therapy and viral vector manufacturing — and across the company’s other business platforms, according to Fellner.

“This allows us to really now focus even more on the clients and establishing the partnerships,” Fellner said. “This is a huge advantage because there’s so much know-how experience in the different modalities.”

Decades of client experience

Lonza contends that it has more than 25 years of GMP manufacturing experience working with over 160 cell and gene customers, as well as more than 30 years of experience in clinical and commercial GMP manufacturing across several modalities.

Among its global network, Lonza’s large-scale clinical to commercial facility in Portsmouth, New Hampshire specializes in the custom production of mammalian biopharmaceuticals and cell therapies. At its expanded site in Geleen, Netherlands, Lonza operates cell and gene therapy process development and manufacturing, mRNA/LNP process and analytical development labs, and clinical GMP capabilities.

Last month, Lonza announced it extended a long-term commercial manufacturing agreement Genetix Biotherapeutics to expand production capacity for a gene therapy approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for pediatric and adult patients with transfusion-dependent beta-thalassemia. Under the expanded partnership, Lonza will increase manufacturing capacity at its facility in Houston, Texas, which is dedicated to cell and gene therapy (CGT) development and manufacturing.

The collaboration with Genetix began in 2013 and supported the therapy’s commercial approval in 2022. Lonza’s Houston site has nearly a decade of combined clinical and commercial manufacturing experience supporting production of Genetix’s therapy. The agreement includes provisions to scale manufacturing capacity in the future for additional Genetix gene therapy programs.

“This partnership very nicely shows the path Lonza takes with its clients, from a very early stage of development all the way through commercialization,” Fellner said. “We have a nice setup that allows us to serve our clients and expand and grow with their needs.”

CGT challenges, opportunities

Fellner acknowledged that CGTs are still nascent modalities, with manufacturing remaining as one of the biggest bottlenecks. However, he said Lonza is advancing CGT manufacturing toward greater scalability, consistency, and accessibility, while expanding its end-to-end manufacturing capabilities to support emerging modalities like mRNA/LNP and microbial-based therapies.

“In cell therapy, especially autologous cell therapy, automation and robotics and digital integration are key areas and a focus of ours as the next step in the journey,” Fellner said. 

Other CDMOs have recently decided to scale back CGT facilities or completely exited the market due to overcapacity and weak demand.

Last year, Rentschler Biopharma announced a strategic realignment of its global operations, including the decision to withdraw from the CGT field due to slower-than-expected growth. Catalent is slated to close its cell therapy center in Belgium amid a reported drop in production, while Charles River Laboratories recently agreed to sell its CDMO and cell solutions businesses to a private investment firm.

“Lonza is committed to the cell and gene therapy market,” Fellner concluded.