Sanofi’s Dagenham plant sold to SOG for regeneration

The future of the former Sanofi manufacturing plant in Dagenham has been secured following an agreement with regeneration specialists SOG Group. The Group has purchased the east London site for an undisclosed sum with the aim of turning 17 acres of highly specialised research and development and manufacturing buildings into a multi-occupancy business and technical park. “We are delighted to confirm the sale of these buildings to SOG Group which will ensure these superb facilities are retained and made available to support other science-related businesses,” said Jim Moretta, Sanofi’s Dagenham site leader. “The retention of these buildings has always been a critical element of our legacy aspirations to see an exciting new business environment created on this site after Sanofi left.” The site will be rebranded as londoneast-UK and operate as a sister park to The Heath in Runcorn, Cheshire. “I’m delighted that SOG Group is taking over these superb facilities,” said John Lewis, Managing Director of SOG. “Our vision is to make londoneast-uk every bit as successful as our operation at The Heath, which is acknowledged as one of the UK’s great regeneration stories.” George Freeman, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Life Sciences, said: “This is a brilliant example – Sanofi working with SOG – pioneering a new way of rapidly converting a site of 20th century big pharma research into an innovator, a catalyst, an incubator for the small companies of tomorrow. Little companies that couldn’t afford the world-class facilities on their own at this site will be able to access world-class facilities to do their research.”