Pfizer Inc has invested S$1 billion (US$743 million) to expand its automated active pharmaceutical ingredient manufacturing facility in Singapore.

The pharma giant seeks to create over 250 new highly skilled jobs, adding to the existing workforce of several hundred staff in the city-state, the company said in a statement on the Singapore Economic Development Board website on Tuesday.

The facility at Tuas Biomedical Park will produce various small molecule active pharmaceutical ingredients, a biologically active drug component, for Pfizer’s oncology, pain and antibiotic medicines. The plant has started commercial manufacturing of products, the statement said.

  - Bloomberg