[ad_1]
Thermo Fisher Scientific, a national scientific instrument, health services and software company, is expanding operations in Austin and expects to create more than 300 jobs in central Texas after a year of growth amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Thermo Fisher’s South Austin campus hired more than 130 people last year to support manufacturing efforts for a component of the company’s TaqPath COVID-19 detection kits that have been in use since receiving emergency clearance. to be used worldwide to detect the coronavirus in humans March 2020.
The additional positions also mean more space. Thermo Fisher’s Austin campus expanded its manufacturing facility by approximately 10,000 square feet for an automated filling line that produces a saliva collection kit used in the COVID-19 detection process.
More:Robots take the wheel: Lyft will offer driverless rides in Austin next year
More:Site near Taylor competes with Austin for $ 17 billion Samsung factory, documents show
More:At home, office or hybrid? Austin employers and workers are finding out
The company plans to add an additional facility east of the current campus on Woodward Street with 125,000 square feet of manufacturing space, which will be used to manufacture COVID-19 RNA vaccines. According to the company, this expansion will require around 125 new employees to meet the demand for the RNA-based vaccines.
Thermo Fisher also plans to expand in Austin outside of its need for COVID-19 related manufacturing. The company selected the Austin location to manufacture a variety of legacy products, allowing for an additional 50,000 square foot expansion of manufacturing space and an additional 120 new employees for the team.
Thermo Fisher, headquartered in Massachusetts, has around 80,000 employees worldwide and annual sales of over 30 billion US dollars.
“The new positions mentioned here to support our expanded manufacturing efforts related to the global response to COVID-19 include facilities, operations, manufacturing, program management, quality, safety, chemistry, engineering, quality control, formulation, packaging, filling, sourcing and more additional support functions, ”said Kelli Bramlett, Site Manager at Thermo Fisher in Austin.
Thermo Fisher will also expand its research and development efforts in Austin, creating between 30 and 50 new scientific positions in 2021-2022. These positions will help drive automation for nucleic acid isolation and new assays for clinical test platforms such as PCR and generation sequencing technologies that are sold worldwide.
“It is a very exciting time of growth and expansion that will continue to build the biotechnology industry in Austin,” said Bramlett.
Editor’s Note: This article has been updated to correct the total number of Thermo Fisher employees and the company’s annual revenue.
[ad_2]
