Baxter: Global player strengthens Austrian operations - future research prospects

Baxter: Gllobal player strengthens Austrian operations - future research prospects

Vienna, 28 April 2008 – “Baxter, the global health care concern, is now reinforcing its presence in Austria by setting up Baxter Innovations GmbH,” says Markus Reinhard, member of Baxter AG’s Management Board, and spokesman for the Company, Vice President for Operations Support and Human Resources at Baxter BioScience Europe and Global Research & Development, and Managing Director of Baxter Innovations GmbH. The global player is explicitly underlining its commitment to Austria and consolidating its position. With its heavy emphasis on research, the Group now employs more than 75 percent of all its BioScience scientists worldwide in the East of Austria. Baxter’s Austrian establishment, with about 3,200 employees, is its largest location outside the United States, and Baxter is one of Austria’s biggest employers.


Hartmut Ehrlich, member of Baxter AG’s Management Board, Vice President, Global Research & Development Baxter BioScience and Managing Director of Baxter Innovations GmbH: “At the start of 2006 there were roughly 600 researchers working in Research and Development for Baxter BioScience worldwide, and by the beginning of 2008 it had risen to more than 900, and around 75% of them are in Austria.”


New research subsidiary Baxter Innovations GmbH

“Baxter is acknowledging the value of the research done in Austria – and used all round the world – by bringing it together in a single research company,” explains Reinhard. “The new Baxter Innovations GmbH bundles all of Baxter’s research activities in Austria. It currently employs 840 people – including those in research support activities such as drug approval and drug safety.”


Baxter AG Austria is responsible for production, which in some cases is worldwide production, and Baxter Vertriebs GmbH is responsible for marketing Baxter products throughout Austria.


Austrian expertise the deciding factor

“The development of our Vienna research facilities has a considerable history,” Reinhard notes: Baxter bought Austria’s Immuno AG in 1996. In collaboration with Vienna University, Immuno developed the first fibrin sealant for surgical applications and the first vaccine against spring-summer tick-borne encephalitis (FSME). “Baxter recognised the potential and drew the logical consequences,” says Reinhard. “Our reason for choosing Austria was not that we were offered specially favourable tax or other incentives, but because we could find the people with the knowledge and skills that we needed.”




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