AstraZeneca to create 1,000 jobs and invest 800 million in R&D in Barcelona, the largest foreign investment in Catalonia’s history

Pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca will invest 800 million euros to create an R&D centre in Barcelona that will become a reference centre for clinical innovation in Europe in the company’s five main therapeutic areas.

The facility will bring together experts in clinical development and operations, pharmaceutical sciences, drug safety and data analytics to develop new therapies and address unmet patient needs. AstraZeneca’s CEO highlighted the importance of public-private collaboration in the development of new medicines and announced the company’s investment plans in Spain until 2025.

In the drug research and development sector, Spain stands out for its high level of professionals and its R&D&I ecosystem. In Catalonia alone, there are 91 research centres and more than 1,300 biopharmaceutical, healthcare, MedTech and digital health companies. The country has authorised more than 900 clinical trials with medicines, demonstrating its commitment to innovation.

The company AstraZeneca has invested more than 93 million euros in innovative projects in 2021, and the investment multiplied last year, reaching almost 400 million euros. In addition, the international pharmaceutical investment project in Barcelona has the support of ACCIÓ-Catalonia Trade & Investment, the Catalan government’s agency for foreign investment and business competitiveness.

Barcelona has become a strategic location for AstraZeneca, especially since it opened, together with Alexion, its clinical trials centre for rare diseases with an investment of 32 million euros. According to ACCIÓ-Catalonia Trade & Investment data, Catalonia ranks sixth in Europe in clinical trial development, with more than 1,200 active trials, 50% in oncology, one of the areas in which AstraZeneca is strongest. This demonstrates the importance of the region to the company’s innovation and drug development strategy.