Novartis (Switzerland) plans to invest $1 billion during the next 5 years to increase R&D activities in China, including a significant expansion of The Novartis Institute of BioMedical Research (CNIBR) in Shanghai.

"We are confident that our expanded investment in R&D will result in innovative therapies for patients in China and other countries nurtured by the growing scientific excellence in China," said Novartis Chairman and CEO Daniel Vasella, in a company statement. "We are also pleased to contribute to the Shanghai government's aim to establish the city as the premiere R&D center for China's bio-medicine industry by 2012, as Novartis is committed to investing to further the Chinese government's strategy for stimulating economic growth, stability and enhancing the livelihood of the Chinese people."

Specifically, the Chinese government aims to provide all citizens with access to affordable, basic healthcare by 2020, involving a $124-billion investment during the next 3 years. Other government plans include improving the country’s information technology systems, and strengthening the nation’s pharmaceutical production quality and safety.

The Novartis Institute for BioMedical Research in Shanghai, located in Zhangjiang High-tech Park, specializes R&D of small-molecule and biologics for diseases prevalent in China. The new expanded institute will be located in a new state-of-the-art campus in Shanghai and will increase collaboration with other Chinese institutes. The institute will work on analytics and biomarkers, in vivo pharmacology, protein production, characterization and scale-up screening, chemistry and proteomics, genomics and imaging. The center is expected to be the largest comprehensive R&D center in China, with associate positions increasing from 160 to nearly 1000.

In related news, Novartis is investing $250 million in a new global technical center in Changshu (China) for technical R&D as well as API manufacturing.

>www.novartis.com