Corporate Backgrounder

Founded more than 35 years ago, Genentech is a leading biotechnology company that discovers, develops, manufactures and commercializes medicines to treat patients with serious or life-threatening medical conditions. The company, a member of the Roche Group, has headquarters in South San Francisco, California. For more information about us, including our mission and values, please click here.

Key Products

Genentech has multiple products on the market for serious or life-threatening medical conditions. In March 2009, Genentech became a member of the Roche Group, and Genentech now serves as the headquarters for all Roche pharmaceutical operations in the United States. Accordingly, the list below includes products, which were previously marketed as Roche products that are now being marketed by Genentech in the United States.

Medicine Development at Genentech

Genentech has an extensive track record in all phases of bringing new disease treatments to patients — from discovery research through clinical development, manufacturing, and commercialization. With multiple protein-based products on the market for serious or life-threatening medical conditions, Genentech has experience taking a drug from A to Z, transforming the seed of an idea in a lab into a novel therapy for a patient in need.

Discovery Research

Research is the wellspring of potential products, and Genentech's research organization is among the world's finest. Genentech's approximately 1,200 researchers and scientists and 135 postdocs consistently publish important papers in prestigious peer-reviewed journals and are among the top researchers in the world in terms of total citations. In addition, Genentech's scientists have secured approximately 10,500 current, non-expired patents worldwide and have approximately 7,000 patent applications pending worldwide. Discovery research at Genentech focuses primarily on Oncology, Immunology, Metabolism, Neuroscience, and Infectious Disease.

To ensure continued scientific excellence, in October 1992 Genentech opened the Founders Research Center, a 275,000 square-foot, $85 million research facility devoted solely to biotechnology. It was dedicated to Bob Swanson and Dr. Herbert Boyer in honor of their pursuit of the promise of biotechnology when they established Genentech in 1976. In April 2001, the company celebrated its 25th anniversary by breaking ground on a 280,000 square foot expansion of the Founders Research Center. Completed in 2003, the complex houses specialized laboratories and state-of-the-science equipment in several interconnected buildings.

Product Development

Genentech uses an extensive set of criteria, including scientific rationale and medical need, to determine which projects to move from discovery research into development. Our clinical scientists and medical professionals then perform the essential role of translating basic science into patient benefit. They help Genentech determine which potential new drugs are tested against specific diseases in the clinic and guide chosen drug candidates through the many phases of clinical testing. Genentech is dedicated to evaluating its therapies in rigorous randomized trials. Our approach is to put a drug candidate through tough clinical testing in order to demonstrate its potential benefit as a therapeutic. Genentech's development pipeline includes multiple projects targeting a range of disease areas across all phases of clinical development.

Manufacturing

Genentech was the first biotechnology company to scale up protein manufacturing successfully from the small quantities used for research to the much larger quantities needed for clinical trials and marketing.

Over the last two decades, Genentech has built world-class production facilities, developed expertise in commercially viable manufacturing processes, and also attracted and retained key personnel with experience in all aspects of large-scale biologics manufacturing. Genentech's manufacturing expertise, capacity and portfolio of capacity enhancement projects position the company well to meet the internally forecasted demands for our products. Our dedication to world-class biologics manufacturing and our careful planning for the future will assist us in continuing to deliver innovative therapies to patients with serious and life-threatening diseases. Genentech's manufacturing network, fully integrated into the Roche Group, includes bulk drug manufacturing in its California locations of South San Francisco, Vacaville, and Oceanside, and fill/finish operations in Hillsboro, Oregon.

Commercialization

The commercial group plays a crucial role in bringing Genentech's therapies to our customers by transforming our scientific innovations into changes in the practice of medicine that enhance and extend patients' lives. The group's primary focus is to market and sell novel, targeted therapies for disease areas with unmet needs. The development and implementation of commercial strategies involves collaboration across a variety of teams with dedicated expertise. These dialogues are supported by intensive market planning to ensure thoughtful understanding of each therapeutic area and customer group and by ongoing examination of broad healthcare marketplace trends.

Product Pipeline

To balance resource use with the strongest likelihood of success, Genentech continuously evaluates its pipeline products in order to determine which are the most promising projects to move through the many phases of clinical testing.

Genentech's development pipeline continues to grow, with multiple promising projects in the following therapeutic focus areas: Oncology, Immunology, Neuroscience, Metabolism, and Infectious Diseases. Our clinical development pipeline includes monoclonal antibodies, small molecules, and antibody drug conjugates that address serious unmet medical needs.

Employees

Genentech employees consistently cite the opportunity to make a difference in the lives of patients as the primary reason they enjoy working at the company. We place great value on our approximately 11,000 dedicated and mission-driven employees and reward them accordingly with a comprehensive and diverse set of benefits and services. The company has consistently been recognized as a top employer by such publications as FORTUNE, Science and Working Mother. In January 2012, FORTUNE named Genentech to its annual list of the "100 Best Companies to Work For" for the 14th consecutive year.

About Genentech Access Solutions

Genentech is committed to people having access to our medicines. Genentech Access Solutions is a team of 350 Genentech employees who help those who need Genentech medicines. This team works with patients and doctors to resolve reimbursement and insurance issues and provides assistance to eligible patients in the United States who do not have insurance coverage or who cannot afford their out-of-pocket co-pay costs.

In 2011, Genentech helped more than 100,000 fully insured, underinsured and uninsured patients with access issues. We have supported co-pay assistance foundations with more than $725 million in donations since 2005. Since 1985, when its first product was approved, Genentech has donated $2.85 billion in free medicine through Genentech® Access to Care Foundation (GATCF) and other product donation programs.