Swiss’ Roche Announces Closing of Plant in Rio de Janeiro

By Lise Alves, Senior Contributing Reporter

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Swiss pharmaceutical giant, Roche, announced on Tuesday it was closing its drug manufacturing plant in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. According to reports, the plant will be deactivated in the next four to five years.

“Given the evolution of the product portfolio and lower future production volumes, Roche has made the difficult decision to plan the elimination of operations at the manufacturing facility in Rio de Janeiro in the next four to five years,” said the company in -mail to news agency Reuters.

The company attributes the decision to the overall strategy of concentrating its efforts on ‘innovative products of high complexity and low production volume’.

Roche currently produces in the country popular brand name drugs such as Bactrim, Bonviva, Cymevene, Dilatrend, Dormonid, Lexotan, Prolopa, Rivotril, Rocaltrol, Rohypnol and Valium.

These drugs, however, according to Roche officials consist of products of high volume and low complexity, which makes the Rio de Janeiro production plant ‘little sustainable’.

Located in the neighborhood of Jacarepaguá, in the western region of Rio de Janeiro, the plant currently employs over 440 persons.

According to local news website G1, Roche Farma Brasil will maintain its headquarters and administrative office in São Paulo, and its distribution center in Anápolis in the Center-West state of Goias.

Roche is just one of several big companies that have announced either a significant reduction or the closing of their operations in the South American country.

In December 2018, airline company Avianca, filed for bankruptcy and later announced a reduction in routes in Brazil.

In February of this year, automaker Ford announced it was closing its truck manufacturing plant in São Bernardo do Campo, located on the outskirts of São Paulo city, laying off approximately 3200 workers.