Novartis Animal Health Canada Inc. held a dedication event to celebrate the completion of a US$ 2.8 million expansion at the Novartis Centre for Aqua Research & Development on Prince Edward Island (PEI), Canada.
The 9,600-square-foot expansion increases Novartis Animal Health’s capabilities in vaccine and novel pharmaceutical drug development for the aquaculture industry. The project added new, state-of-the-art laboratories, as well as additional office space.
“The Research and Development facility on Prince Edward Island is at the center of our commitment to global innovation for vaccines that prevent diseases in farmed fish,” says Folkert Kamphuis, General Manager, Novartis Animal Health North America. “The expansion of this vital component of Novartis Aqua Health is expected to help us maintain our competitive advantage in innovation.”
NAH has invested more than US$ 13 million in the Aqua R&D and manufacturing operations in the last several years, including a new marine R&D center in Victoria and a manufacturing facility and distribution center in Charlottetown.
At the dedication event, senior Novartis representatives joined government officials, including Prince Edward Island Premier Robert Ghiz, to highlight the significance of this latest investment at PEI. Premier Ghiz took a tour of the latest addition to the Aqua Health R&D facility, a project that created a dozen new jobs in the province.
“These new laboratories and other investments by Novartis for the expansion of the Aqua Health facility are important milestones in building the bioscience cluster in Prince Edward Island,” said Premier Ghiz. “The particular work being done by Novartis in developing vaccines to improve the efficiency and quality of fish farming are expected to also have an important impact on our fisheries, and those around the world. I congratulate Novartis on completing this important project.”
This laboratory expansion contributes to the Prince Edward Island government’s Island Prosperity Strategy that identifies bioscience as one of four strategic sectors targeted for investment and development. Since the implementation of the Island Prosperity Strategy three years ago, the bioscience sector has increased revenues to $78 million and added more than 200 full-time positions.
The PEI site is one of five worldwide NAH Research & Development centers for animal health. The company’s other R&D centers focus on medicines for pets and livestock, and are located in the US, Australia and Switzerland.
NAH was the first company to develop and license vaccines for infectious salmon anemia virus and infectious hematopoietic necrosis virus, which are deadly to salmon and financially damaging to fish farmers. Today, NAH offers a broad range of salmonid vaccines as well as products to control sea lice.
Members of the Aqua Health team at NAH’s PEI site recently received a grant from the Atlantic Innovation Fund for up to $2.6 million to study host-parasite interactions and work on developing treatment for the sea lice parasite in cultured salmon. Last year, NAH announced its support of the new Sea Lice Research Centre, a center devoted to research of sea life and maintaining an integrated database resource about the parasite.
