White House, Cost Plus Drugs’ new drug manufacturing alliance: 5 notes 

The White House has launched a new program focused on leveraging technology and private sector partnerships to find new ways to quickly produce key pharmaceutical ingredients and finished drugs at the point-of-care. 

The initiative, called Equip-A-Pharma, involves collaborations with Mark Cuban’s Cost Plus Drugs and three other healthcare partners. 

Five details: 

1. The effort aims to strengthen the nation’s drug supply chain by enabling quicker approval times for drugs produced using novel manufacturing technologies, lowering production costs, reducing shortages and improving rapid response to national emergencies, officials said in a May 15 news release.
   
   
2. The program includes partnerships with four private health companies: Cost Plus Drugs; Battelle Memorial Institute and Aprecia; Bright Path; and New Brunswick, N.J.-based Rutgers University. Over the next year, the companies will work to demonstrate how their technologies can support the production of active pharmaceutical ingredients and finished drugs closer to the point of care, such as in hospitals.
   
   
3. Here is a breakdown of what each company is working on:
   
   
   • Cost Plus Drugs is testing a highly automated platform using AI for real-time quality monitoring. The system will be used to produce lidocaine (a local anesthetic) and diltiazem (a calcium channel blocker used for heart conditions.)
     
   • Battelle and Aprecia are combining machine learning and 3D printing to make oral tablets of levetiracetam (an anti-seizure medication) and linezolid (an antibiotic for serious bacterial infections).
     
   • Bright Path is leveraging continuous flow manufacturing of lidocaine HCl (an injectable anesthetic) and carboplatin (a chemotherapy drug). The company’s technology is designed to switch between different drug products rapidly with minimal downtime.
     
   • Rutgers University will manufacture registration batches of bupivacaine HCl (a long-acting local anesthetic) and albuterol sulfate (a bronchodilator used to treat asthma and other lung conditions) using an agile, AI-integrated manufacturing platform.

While the medications themselves are generics, the companies must secure FDA approval for producing them using these new manufacturing technologies. White House officials said they expect the partners to submit abbreviated new drug applications to the FDA within a year.

4. The move comes amid growing concern in the healthcare industry that tariffs may drive up drug costs or restrict access to critical medicines. Currently, a 10% baseline tariff is in effect on nearly all U.S. trading partners. A 10% baseline tariff currently applies to most trading partners, and federal officials have signaled additional levies on drug imports may follow in the coming months. Hospitals have urged the Trump administration to exempt medical supplies and pharmaceuticals from these tariffs.
   
   
5. The initiative also comes just days after President Trump signed an executive order aimed at lowering drug prices. The May 12 order directs drugmakers to sell medicines in the U.S. at prices “in line with comparably developed nations,” or face penalties and enforcement actions. It tasks HHS with setting price targets within 30 days to bring down U.S. drug costs. Read more about the order here.