Touchlight opens GMP production facility

Touchlight Genetics Ltd has established a GMP facility to support development of therapeutic products that incorporate the company’s revolutionary dbDNA™ vector technology. The facility will support clinical and commercial production for both in-house and partnered programs.

Touchlight has developed a revolutionary DNA vector known as doggybone™ DNA (dbDNA) which enables uniquely differentiated products across multiple advanced therapeutic modalities. dbDNA™ is enzymatically produced and can be manufactured at commercial scale DNA in a two-week process, disrupting the decades old fermentation approach.

The new facility comprises four suites, which collectively occupy a <50m² foot print, and is capable of an annual production capacity of 100s of grams of GMP DNA. The facility is situated within the restored Hampton Water Works situated on the River Thames in West London.

Touchlight’s expansion comes at a time where there is dramatic growth in the area of advanced therapy, with hundreds of cell and gene therapy products currently in clinical trials and multiple landmark FDA approvals in 2017. Touchlight is partnering with leading biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies in this space in order to commercialise its technology platform.

Advanced medicines manufacturing is a growing focus in the UK, gaining significant investment from both private and public sources, including £270m through the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund. Expansion of Touchlight’s DNA platform, that aims to underpin the success of advanced medicines, will directly support the mission to establish the UK life sciences sector as a world leader.

Following on from the opening of its R&D laboratory space in August 2017, the first phase of Touchlight’s site expansion is now complete. The expansion means that Touchlight is now ideally placed to enable a revolution in medicine with its cutting-edge DNA technology.

For further questions, please contact: info@touchlight.com

- ENDS -

About Touchlight

Touchlight is a privately-owned CDMO based in London, U.K., focused on the provision of DNA services and manufacture of enzymatically produced doggybone DNA (dbDNA™) to enable the development of genetic medicines. Touchlight provide rapid, enzymatic DNA development and manufacturing for all advanced therapy production, including mRNA, viral and non-viral gene therapy and DNA API. dbDNA is a minimal, linear, covalently closed structure, which eliminates bacterial sequences. Touchlight’s revolutionary enzymatic production platform enables unprecedented speed, scale, and the ability to target genes with a size and complexity that is impossible with current technologies. Clients can be supported from pre-clinical through development and supply, to licencing and tech transfer for use in-house.

For more information please contact: