BioNTech Starts Shuttering Singapore mRNA Manufacturing Site Amid Pipeline Pivot

BioNTech envisioned the site making hundreds of millions of vaccines a year, but has since shifted its pipeline to other modalities while mRNA technology continues to face headwinds in the U.S.

This is more evidence, if it were needed, that the Big Pharma excursion into mRNA injections, and other ‘advanced therapies’, is drawing to a close:

BioNTech Starts Shuttering Singapore mRNA Manufacturing Site Amid Pipeline Pivot

BioNTech envisioned the site making hundreds of millions of vaccines a year, but has since shifted its pipeline to other modalities while mRNA technology continues to face headwinds in the U.S.

BioNTech is closing a Singapore production plant less than four years after buying the site from Novartis to supply mRNA vaccines and therapies in the Asia-Pacific region.

When BioNTech bought the facility in November 2022, the company expected the facility to be fully operational in late 2023 and create more than 100 jobs. This week, BioNTech told The Straits Times that the planned Singapore site will close by the end of February. The company employs 85 people at the plant…

…The company bought the plant to support clinical and commercial supply of its mRNA vaccines and therapeutics across the Asia-Pacific region. However, BioNTech’s R&D pipeline subsequently diversified beyond mRNA, setting the company up for growth even as Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. came down hard on the technology over the past year. In August, Kennedy canceled around $500 million in BARDA contracts associated with mRNA vaccine development, for example.

“Under the FDA and [Health Secretary] RFK Jr., it really feels like they’ve declared war on mRNA vaccines,” Piper Sandler analyst Ted Tenthoff said at an event with Moderna in December 2025.

BioNTech’s initial plans for the Singapore site included potential expansions to support production of other drug classes, such as cell therapies. However, the primary purpose of the facility was to establish the capacity to make several hundred million doses of mRNA-based vaccines a year. With vaccine sales falling and BioNTech’s pipeline evolving, the company’s need for that level of capacity has diminished.

Remember, Novartis sold the plant to BioNTech!

So, Novartis is out, otherwise it would have held on to the site.

I’ll be sharing more good news like this in the coming weeks and months, so stay tuned :)

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