Merck Opens M Lab™ Collaboration Center in São Paulo, Brazil

• New collaboration center to provide support from pre-clinical through full-scale production in a non-GMP environment
• Hands-on customer access to Merck’s product portfolio, technical expertise

São Paulo, Brazil, October 4, 2018 — Merck, the vibrant science and technology company, today officially opened a state-of-the-art M Lab™ Collaboration Center in Brazil, serving the Latin America region. The center will provide Life Science customers with a shared, exploratory environment where they can closely collaborate with Merck scientists and engineers to solve their toughest challenges and accelerate development and production of new therapies.

"With a rapidly growing biopharmaceutical industry in Brazil and Latin America, and demand for novel and cost-effective therapies worldwide, there is a need for full end-to-end process development support," said Udit Batra, member of the Merck Executive Board and CEO, Life Science. "At our M Lab™ Collaboration Center, customers will benefit from Merck’s deep technical expertise to develop processes for manufacturing drugs faster, safer and more effectively than in the past."

The 1,000-square meter lab facility includes non-GMP pilot and bench scale labs for customers to engage in process development support, troubleshooting, demonstrations and hands-on training. It is one of nine such centers around the world, each of which allows pharmaceutical manufacturers to explore new ways to increase productivity, improve processes and mitigate risks. Each year, more than 1,500 customers visit Merck’s M Lab™ Collaboration Centers, where they work alongside Merck’s team of experts and get access to sizing and simulation tools and methodologies as well as analytical and modeling support. Formal bioprocessing courses are also available, including traditional classroom-style training and interactive, hands-on sessions. Other M Lab™ Collaboration Center locations include China, Singapore, Japan, South Korea, India, France and the United States.

Merck opened its first customer-facing laboratory in 1995 in Massachusetts, USA. The global network has steadily grown over the years, not only to meet the training and process development needs of customers in local regions, but also to allow and ensure successful technology transfer between countries for global customers. In 2015, Merck began reimagining these labs as the M Lab™ Collaboration Centers with a focus on customers.

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About Merck

Merck, a leading science and technology company, operates across healthcare, life science, and electronics. Around 58,000 employees work to make a positive difference to millions of people’s lives every day by creating more joyful and sustainable ways to live. From advancing gene-editing technologies and discovering unique ways to treat the most challenging diseases to enabling the intelligence of devices – the company is everywhere. In 2020, Merck generated sales of € 17.5 billion in 66 countries.

Scientific exploration and responsible entrepreneurship have been key to Merck’s technological and scientific advances. This is how Merck has thrived since its founding in 1668. The founding family remains the majority owner of the publicly listed company. Merck holds the global rights to the Merck name and brand. The only exceptions are the United States and Canada, where the business sectors of Merck operate as EMD Serono in healthcare, MilliporeSigma in life science, and EMD Electronics.