Investment Update – Avril 2008

Ontario Investing In New Life-Saving Vaccines

 

Joins forces with Sanofi Pasteur to fight life-threatening diseases

 

TORONTO – Ontario, Canada is joining forces with global pharmaceutical company Sanofi Pasteur to fight life-threatening diseases like whooping cough and colorectal cancer.

The province is investing $13.9 million from its Next Generation of Jobs Fund to support research on new vaccines. The investment is part of Sanofi Pasteur's $101.5-million expansion that includes a new research centre. The centre will improve existing vaccines and bring new products to market. Construction is slated to begin this year.

Sanofi Pasteur's investment means 900 existing research and manufacturing jobs will be retained and 30 new permanent high-skill research jobs will be created. About 300 new construction jobs will also be created while the expansion is being built.

Discovering new vaccines for illnesses often takes years of study.  Investing in health research means companies can hire more scientists and fuel new discoveries that could eventually save lives around the world.

Ontario is home to one of the world's leading biopharmaceutical industries. The biopharmaceutical sector employs over 15,000 Ontarians in high-value jobs, including researchers and scientists.

The announcement comes from the government's Biopharmaceutical Investment Program (BIP), which helps advance research and investment in Ontario's biotech sector.

BIP is aimed at attracting new or enhanced biopharmaceutical investments in Ontario.  $150 million will be available over the next 5 years.  BIP is the first component of the Government of Ontario’s $1.15 billion Next Generation of Jobs Fund strategy and will fund up to 20% of total eligible project costs.

"This new research in Ontario will not only create jobs, it will bring hope to people affected by disease," said Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty.

"Companies like Sanofi Pasteur choose to do business with Ontario because we attract many of the best scientists and medical researchers in the world," said John Wilkinson, Ontario Minister of Research and Innovation.

Diseases like whooping cough kill about 279,000 people worldwide each year.

The first whooping cough vaccine was created at Sanofi Pasteur's Connaught Laboratories in Toronto in 1926.

Contacts Presse :

Ray Lancashire - Relations Presse

  • Ministère du Développement Economique et du Commerce
    900 Bay Street, 5th Floor, Hearst Block, Toronto, Ontario M7A 2E1
    Tel:  00 1 416 326-1608
    Fax : 00 1 416 325-6375
    E-mail: ray.lancashire@edt.gov.on.ca

    •  

    IRIS CONSEIL
    Christine Arnal
    Tél : 00 33 (1) 45 44 04 21
    Fax: 00 33 (1) 45 44 18 14
    E-mail: c.arnal@iris-conseil.net
    & Site: http://www.iris-conseil.net

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