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Avexis Colorado Waste of Money

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Novartis bought the plant for pennies on the dollar.

So it buys them virtually instant manufacturing capability/capacity while they build the plant in North Carolina that won’t be ready for at least 2 years.

There is the Amgen connection between Andrew and this site

What it means for libertyville? Time will tell. Libertyville will be the smallest site (distant 3rd in capacity) once the NC site is up and running

Whether Libertyville will stay open as more of a test bed or closes in 3 years years is the million dollar question
 




Avexis uses pods. Greenfield sites should be simple. No idea why it would take so long to build out NC.

Do you have any idea how much it will cost to retro fit Longmont. This group of people isn’t what you want to bet our future on.

Novartis’ money so who cares though.
 




6 pods in libertyville

12 in Nc with a tentative plan to expand to 24.

The bottom line is Longmont offers over 700,000 sq ft while Libertyville is 40,000 sq ft

So again, Fromm an efficiency stand point- libertyville doesn’t make any sense. But it could be used to work out the kinks before active production is put in place at the much bigger sites-those being NC and now Longmont.

Also telling that Novartis turned down $10M in incentives to expand the libertyville site and instead took $3M from NC.
 




Instant? It’ll take 6–12 months to staff. 6 to plan and two years to remodel. A lot of the staff laid off left CO or took other jobs.

The group leading the Longmont effort already blew the Lake Centre project and got themselves closed.

The NC project should have future proofed production. It’s concerning that it was so undersized that Novartis needed to buy another 700000 sf. Makes no sense.

Used roller bottle plants don’t make your biologics life easier.

But if you work in libertyville consider yourself laid off. Run down plants by dentist offices in suburbia don’t stay open. Hope you didn’t move there for Avexis.
 




















How are the working conditions and morale/environment at AveXis Longmont currently? I know it was a big deal when they came in and saved the day by buying the site and hiring all of the AZ staff... but how is it really? Trying to decide whether to apply for a position there or not...
 




It’s a job. We were all laid off so it’s better than that. Novartis doesn’t need this site. I doubt we’ll ever make anything. A Avexis VP used to work here and I think he felt sorry for us and had their money to spend. We call ourselves Andrew’s pets because of that. Free money and disorganization so if that’s your thing then come on over.
 




As a Novartis employee I can say that Novartis does not think. It does what it is told by the people they pay loads of money. If they are given good advice for decisions, it is all good otherwise s***. You know someone at Novartis from a previous association and you are a pig and don’t want that person to do well, all you do is bad mouth this person and guarantee that no matter how good he/she is they are gone. Big companies don’t think. The people and their lives mean nothing to them. They have loads of money to show what they do for people and conveniently and slowly get rid of anything and anyone who has a brain. The medical directors do not have American degrees and those with and without American degrees have no patient or US experience at all, forget in the area that they are assigned. Anyone with the right experience is a threat as knowledge is power and they don’t want to share power. Stay long hours, act useless, do exactly what they want to do to show and you will be fine. If they want Avexis, they will keep it. There is no sense to this decision. It is based on the recommendation of highly paid Deloitte and mainly McKinsey consultants who talk big but are hollow inside.
 




























Get a clue. Three sites are trying to make this in the US and one is making it in Europe. For roughly 1000 patients a year? Yeah, they need a million square feet of space in Colorado for that. We were bought because of the ex-Amgen staff at Avexis and because it was dirt cheap. Those ex-Amgen executives were fired so we don’t have anyone who cares if Colorado stays open now. Plus the site was so cheap it’s a minor write off when they close it. But until that is figured out they’ll still hire another dozen or two people.
 




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