From: Caribbean Business

Warner Chilcott Company Inc. will be expanding and ugrading its operations in Fajardo. The company will be investing an undisclosed sum to improve efficiency and to prepare the plant technologically for future product lines that it hopes to bring to the island.

The plant in Fajardo specializes in manufacturing and packaging women’s healthcare products, which include oral contraceptives and hormonal replacement products. They also produce and package dermatology products.

“Right now, we are expanding our capacity inside the existing building to make our hormone operation more efficient and functional. This doesn’t necessarily imply that we are going to be hiring more people. Also, we want to prepare ourselves for any future products (that could come to the plant) because the company is active in business development, acquiring products and looking for alternatives. Recently, our company has been involved in agreements with other companies to acquire the rights to develop and market different products.” said Max Torres, Warner Chilcott general manager of business operations.

According to Torres, the plant has been in Fajardo for approximately 40 years. It was originally part of Warner Lambert. Between 2000 and 2001, Pfizer acquired Warner Lambert. “At that time, Pfizer had basically three plants in Puerto Rico: Barceloneta, Vega Baja and Fajardo. Then when Pfizer acquired Pharmacia, they decided that they wanted to reduce the number of plants and were looking at alternatives for the Fajardo plant, including closure.”

Torres indicated that through a twist of fate or destiny, the Fajardo plant was saved from closure. “At the time, Warner Chilcott was planning to build a manufacturing facility in Ireland; they had already acquired property there for that purpose. But when they realized there was a good facility available (Fajardo) in Puerto Rico with highly skilled employees, they decided they wanted to acquire it from Pfizer and did so in June 2004.

“At that point, that purchase basically is what permitted the securing of some 300 to 350 jobs that Pfizer was planning to let go. Since then, we have been moving a lot of our products to this facility.”

According to Torres, the employment level at the Fajardo plant is somewhere around 320 to 330 employees. Depending on the volume levels, there are times when they also need to hire temporary workers.

Warner Chilcott Limited, a specialty pharmaceutical company, engages in the development, manufacture, marketing, and sale of branded prescription pharmaceutical products in women’s healthcare and dermatology segments in the United States and internationally.