More Pfizer plants axed as restructuring continues

15/09/2006 - Pfizer’s manufacturing reforms have claimed more casualties in two North American plants as the world’s largest drugmaker battles to realign production capacity with future product mix, new technologies and cost effectiveness.

The two sites in Arnprior, Ontario, and Lee's Summit, Missouri, have been dropped as part of Pfizer's multi-year review of all manufacturing operations that began in 2003 following the acquisition of Pharmacia.
After its merger with Warner Lambert in 2000, Pfizer acquired Pharmacia for $60bn (€47.1bn) in 2003 and has been trying to sort out its manufacturing network ever since.

Over the past three years Pfizer has announced plans to divest or close more than two dozen plants globally, reducing the number of its manufacturing facilities from 93 to 64.

“The company needs to transform its global manufacturing capabilities to match the type of new products emerging from our pipeline and overall product demand,” Pfizer spokeswoman Judy Sandlin Brooks told In-PharmaTechnologist.com.

“So there is an underlying trend, we are implementing a global initiative to adjust our production capacity.”

The Arnprior site manufactures and packages various prescription and over-the-counter products in tablet or capsule form, including Norvasc, Viagra, Reactine and Visine, but Pfizer says it can make these products now cheaper elsewhere and wants sites that can also make inhalable and injectable drugs.

link to full article