France Relance program: SEQENS new paracetamol production unit

After a full year of R&D studies, SEQENS has officially launched the project to build a new paracetamol production unit, in partnership with Sanofi and UPSA and with the support of the France Relance programme. Innovative, competitive and environmentally friendly, the unit will have a capacity of 10,000 tonnes of paracetamol per year, will be built on the Roussillon platform (38) and will be commissioned in 2023.

Relocation of paracetamol production

Announced by the French Président de la République in the middle of the health crisis on 17 June 2020 in Marcy l’Etoile (69), this emblematic project to locate the production of an essential active ingredient in France and Europe is also a technological, industrial and commercial challenge.

As an integrated player in the medicines production chain, from the production of intermediates to the production of active pharmaceutical ingredients and from research and development to industrialisation, and as the world leader in the paracetamol production chain with two efficient and sustainable plants in China, Seqens quickly mobilised its research and development teams at its Seqens’Lab in Porcheville (78) to design a competitive and environmentally friendly facility in France to meet the growing demand for this essential active ingredient, which was in short supply during the health crisis.

After a year of research and development involving dozens of researchers, Seqens has succeeded in developing new continuous synthesis processes that guarantee the construction of a high-performance, innovative and competitive installation in the long term with an environmental footprint reduced by a factor of 5 to 10 compared to existing units.

A new facility located in Roussillon

With the support of the French government within the framework of the France Relance programme and the long-term commitments made by Sanofi and UPSA, Seqens was also able to secure part of the financing and the viability of this project over the long term. Finally, Seqens has planned to set up a facility on the Roussillon platform (38), where the last paracetamol production workshop closed by the Rhodia group in 2008 was located, so that the new unit can benefit fully from the proximity of Seqens’ pharmaceutical activities and in particular its new GMP laboratory, and from access to the shared infrastructures of the OSIRIS economic interest group, the platform’s operator and, in particular, to low-carbon energy thanks to the very substantial investments made in recent years with the support of all the platform’s industrials who have been committed to this energy transition approach for many years.

I welcome the realisation of this project to relocate the production of the active ingredient paracetamol in France. The health crisis has shown us that it is essential to invest in order to strengthen the resilience of our production capacities for health products and thus ensure the health sovereignty of the European Union. This is the meaning of the action taken by this Government in the framework of the France Relance Programme, under the impetus of the President of the Republic

The Seqens group is proud to be able to invest in disruptive technologies to relocate an emblematic molecule such as paracetamol to the Roussillon platform while guaranteeing a high level of performance and a competitive, sustainable and green production.