Government of Canada

Welcome to Invest in Canada 0 Email Us your Questions
Sign Up for our Newsletter
Contact Our Global Network





Home > Industry Sectors > Life Sciences > Pharmaceuticals > Success Stories

Success Stories

International Pharmaceutical companies are successful in Canada and this page highlights their achievements. You can use this section in three ways:

  1. Success Stories

  2. Case Studies
    Review our list of case studies to learn more about the lessons learned from your colleagues.

  3. Database Search
    Search our foreign investment database on recent investments

Success Stories

Novopharm of Israel invests $20 million to expand its Markham facility
In order to keep up with the growing North American demand for its products, Novopharm is expanding its Centre of Excellence for the Production of Penicillin Products in Markham.

AstraZeneca benefits from and invests heavily in Ontario and Quebec
AstraZeneca Canada—which has an R&D; facility in Montreal and field offices across the country—has invested $21 million in the ongoing construction of an amenities building at its head office in Mississauga.

Solvay Pharma of Belgium invests $8 million to modernize its plant in Quebec
The Canadian arm of Belgian multinational Solvay Group has invested more than $8 million to upgrade the facility which is the only one in North America to manufacture lactulose, a lactose-based medication widely used in gastroenterology.

Excellent business climate spurs growth at Taro Pharmaceuticals
Since 1984, more than $70 million has been invested in Taro Canada, building research, manufacturing, marketing and distribution operations.

Quebec wins Tennessee-based DiaTech’s Confidence — hands down
An advanced life sciences cluster, a rich infrastructure of universities and attractive tax incentives were among the key reasons that motivated Tennessee-based DiaTech Oncology to choose Montréal for its new clinical pathology laboratory, in April 2004.

New Jersey’s Merck Frosst discovers many advantages of doing R&D; in Montreal
Merck Frosst—a division of New Jersey-based Merck & Co. , Inc. and one of Canada's leading research-based pharmaceutical companies—invested $116 million in research and development in Canada.

Case Studies

Xenon Genetics of Vancouver signed a US$87 million deal with Warner-Lambert before it merged with Pfizer. The ongoing collaboration identifies novel drug targets and lead compounds for treating low HDL-Cholesterol.

Affinium Pharmaceuticals of Toronto and Pfizer announced a discovery alliance to ascertain the structure, function and druggability of targets in Pfizer discovery programs. The partnership is worth up to US$30 million before royalties.

MethylGene Inc. of Montreal reached a worldwide license, research, development and commercialization agreement with Merck-Frosst for a small molecule inhibitor program against bacterial beta-lactamases that fights antibiotic resistance.

Cardiome Pharma Corp. of Vancouver and Fujisawa Healthcare Inc. announced a US$68 million partnership for co-development of Cardiome´s proprietary intravenous antiarrhythmic agent RSD1235, to be commercialized in North America by Fujisawa.

Angiotech Pharmaceuticals Inc. of Vancouver announced that its partner, Boston Scientific, had received U.S. FDA approval for the Taxus™ stent, developed using Angiotech´s technology.

Database Search