Protein Sciences Corporation, UMN Pharma Inc. and IHI Corporation announced that they have entered into an agreement to assess the feasibility of sourcing the active ingredients of Flublok influenza vaccine from Japan. The drug substances would be manufactured at the Gifu (Japan) Plant of UNIGEN, a subsidiary of UMN Pharma in which IHI holds 50% of the common shares. UNIGEN manufactures Flublok for UMN Pharma at the 21,000L scale - ten times the scale the vaccine is manufactured in the United States.

The Gifu plant has two 21,000L bioreactors and has the capacity to add six additional bioreactors. UMN holds a license from Protein Sciences for Flublok for the territories of Japan, China, Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Singapore. UMN is partnered with Astellas to market Flublok in Japan.