Welcome to From the Forest City – your source for exciting ideas, innovations, and expertise coming out of London, Canada. In these videos brought to you by the LEDC, you’ll soon discover why companies are investing and growing in London, and how their talented teams and products are making an impact.
You’ll hear from growing local businesses about how they're expanding into new markets, launching new products, making investments, and local industry experts on topics that are relevant to your business. Every now and then we will speak with experts outside of London who have valuable insights to share with local businesses.
Enjoy!
Episode 6
We are speaking with Tam Vo, Owner and President, Diana Nguyen, Owner & VP Finance, and Mukesh Sareen, VP Operations of ANVO Pharma Group, a science centre and pharmaceutical group located in Canada and Vietnam, who are expanding the company to build ANVO Laboratories Inc. here in London. A three-stage expansion, the first phase will have ANVO making generic drugs in a 40,000 square foot facility, opening 2022. The second phase, projected for 2024, will expand their manufacturing capacity to produce injectable drugs, and the third phase (2026) will include vaccine production – all three phases resulting in several job opportunities across head office functions, production, and research and development.
Transcript
Tam: Anvo Pharma Group is a science centre pharmaceutical group which specializes in developing, manufacturing, marketing, packaging, and distributing high quality, generic products globally. We are passionate about people, pharmaceuticals, global healing power and of course making a difference in the quality of life for others. We have three divisions: ANVO Pharma Group, ANVO Laboratories, and TAVO Pharma.
My wife Diana and I started the business over ten years ago in Saigon, Vietnam. We moved to Canada five years ago with our two sons, and we fell in love with this beautiful country. We dreamed of moving our company to Canada.
With offices in Saigon and Ontario, serving 14 populous globally, the need for our own R&D centre is the next logically step in our expansion. London will be our new global headquarters for ANVO Pharma Group and ANVO Laboratories. We just celebrated our groundbreaking ceremony and are so excited to grow our business in London.
We researched many cities in Ontario and decided on the City of London. London Economic Development Corporation and the City of London provided fantastic support every step of the way. London has a strong reputation in healthcare, life sciences, they also have the world class hospitals and excellent colleges and universities. London also is close to both U.S. and Canada borders, which will be a great advantage since we will be exporting 85% of our products globally.
Mukesh: We have planned to approach this in a phased manner. In Phase 1, it will be fully dedicated for oral dosage units and it will comprise of tablets and capsules. We will be having a 40,000 square foot facility, and construction will start in this year 2020, by quarter 2 of 2021 we will have our R&D centre ready, and by quarter 3 of 2022 our main production will start – commercial practice will come up.
Phase 2 will be fully dedicated for injectables, and we will be having a liquid, powder, and vials. Phase 2 will be ready by 2025. This will be followed by Phase 3 that will be fully dedicated for vaccines. In all the 3 phases, we will have an employment for around 100 to 150 employment. I am very much happy to see our dream come true.
Tam: We are so excited about our expansion in London, where Canadian pharmaceutical products will be made for Canadians, by Canadians. ANVO Laboratories is truly proud to be Canadian.
Transcribed by Speak
