Listen: How Lundbeck’s Bothell Team Turns Ideas into Reality

When people think of R&D, it’s easy to imagine the research, but the other half of that equation — development — is just as critical to bringing lifesaving therapies to patients.

At Lundbeck’s Seattle biopharmaceuticals office in Bothell, Washington, Byron Kneller, Vice President of Process Development, and his team in the Process Development Center for Excellence serve as an intermediary between the research and manufacturing departments, constantly seeking ways to streamline processes to bring innovative research to market quickly. Equipped with diverse skills and expertise including molecular biology, cell purification, and analytics, the team’s combined talents ensure a project’s success.

“We’re the process engineers,” Kneller said. “We’re particularly lucky here in the development side. I’ve talked to colleagues who have worked in the early phase of the industry at big pharma companies, at jobs they’ve had for 20 years, and they’ve not seen a molecule make it all the way into the clinic or into the commercial phase to help patients. We work further on in the process, so those of us who work in this space have touched a number of molecules that have made it into commercial products and are helping patients.”

Kneller has lived in Washington for over 20 years and his love for the region and its life sciences strengthens his commitment to his work.
“The Puget Sound area is a hard place to move away from. It’s beautiful,” Kneller said. “And if you have work that’s fulfilling that you enjoy doing, it’s doubly hard to leave.”

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Sponsored by Life Science Washington and Lundbeck