Milestones Icon: Amgen Inc.

For 30 years, Boulder County’s highly educated work force and pharmaceutical manufacturer Amgen Inc. have been a good fit for each other.

Amgen is invested in the community. It employs 950 staff.

Marvin Caruthers, a renowned professor of chemistry and biochemistry at the University of Colorado, co-founded Amgen in 1980 in California with seven other research scientists and three venture capital groups.

Amgen has locations all over the world, including Longmont and Boulder. I

In Longmont, Amgen is located at the corner of Airport and Nelson roads where it houses manufacturing, administration, quality control testing and warehousing for all Colorado operations. Bob Harker has been the executive director in Boulder County, overseeing the production of multiple clinical and commercial products, for 17 years.

With 232 acres at that location, the company has long-term development rights for up to 5 million square feet in building space.

In Boulder, Amgen began in 1981 with 15 staff as a research company. In the 1990s, the company switched from a research and development facility to a manufacturing facility in Boulder County with the purchase of Synergen. Today, its Boulder location at LakeCentre Business Park employs one-third of the staff.

Staff in Longmont and Boulder manufactures Epogen (Epoetin alfa), Aranesp (darbepoetin alfa), Kineret (anakinra), Kepivance (palifermin), Nplate (romiplostim) and Prolia/Xgeva (denosumab). These treat, among other conditions, chronic kidney disease, and the affects of rheumatoid arthritis and high doses of chemotherapy.

Amgen is credited with being one of the first companies to realize biotechnology’s new promise through medicine. It pioneered the development of novel products based on advances in recombinant DNA and molecular biology.

Dave Bengston, vice president and general manager of Colorado operations, said that Amgen came to Boulder County because of Caruthers’ connections there and the city’s business infra structure. Bengston was key in building out Amgen’s facility in Longmont.

In Colorado in 2010, more than 100 nonprofits benefited from Amgen or Amgen staff donations. Amgen’s matching grant program donates $500 for every 15 hours a staff member volunteers.

on Facebook on LinkedIn