Sana Biotechnology drops Washington plant build-out, pivots to CDMOs instead
Sana Biotechnology, which had planned to produce drugs in-house, will instead turn to CDMOs for manufacturing and pause the build-out of an internal production facility in Bothell, Washington.
The company announced the manufacturing reversal in its second-quarter financial results released August 11. As a result of the decision and other developments during the quarter, the company took a non-cash impairment charge of $44.6 million, resulting in a net loss of $93.6 million. The impairment charge was primarily related to Sana’s 80,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in Bothell, the company said in the release.
“Because of the increased availability of manufacturing capacity at third-party contract development and manufacturing organizations (CDMOs) for cell and gene therapy products as well as progress in understanding our near-term manufacturing needs, we expect to use CDMOs to meet our manufacturing needs at present and have suspended further build-out of our internal manufacturing capabilities,” the company said.
In a quarterly filing with the SEC, Sana said it plans to "pursue potential subleases" for the site in Bothell and lab/office space in Seattle.
Sana set eyes on the Bothell site, which used to be an AT&T call center, in 2022 after ditching plans to run its production in Fremont, California. At the time, Sana expected the move to allow the biotech to save about $100 million in expenses over three years.
The company opened the Bothell site in August 2024, according to reports.
Sana Biotechnology ditches California manufacturing plans in bid to save $100M
Although it raised $588 million in its initial public offering in 2021, Sana has experienced a rocky road in the years since.
It began cutting some product development late last year, which came on the heels of trimming about 30% of its staff the previous year.
But this year, the company has celebrated progress with its potential "functional cure" for type 1 diabetes. In June, six-month results from UP421, an allogeneic primary islet cell therapy, showed the potential of the treatment approach, Sana said in a release at the time.
