Sanofi to build vaccine facility with government help

Sanofi Pasteur Limited will receive up to $70 million to help construct the 150,000-square-foot Bulk Biologics Facility at the Connaught Campus in Toronto. The governments of Canada and Ontario contributed the amount to help establish the $500-million vaccine-manufacturing facility. Through the Advanced Manufacturing Fund, FedDev Ontario contributed $20 million, which is a repayable contribution. For its part, the Government of Ontario is investing $50 million through the Jobs and Prosperity Fund. Considered as one of the most advanced of its kind in the world, the facility is expected to double the production of Sanofi Pasteur's life-saving vaccines by 2023, which is the target year of operation. The initiative will also launch the Canadian-researched and -developed pertussis or whooping cough vaccine into more than 30 new global markets. An estimated 1,250 jobs will be created or maintained through this project. Sanofi Pasteur is the vaccines division of Sanofi, which invested $130 million into R&D in Canada in 2016, and whose entities employ close to 1,900 people.