In 2010, cancer-therapy innovator Dendreon announced it would build a 160,000-square-foot facility in Union City, Ga., and hire hundreds to manufacture sipuleucel-T, a promising treatment for patients with advanced prostate cancer, marketed under the brand name Provenge.
With each cell collection processed at the facility representing one man’s potential survival, the quality of training is critical. That’s why Dendreon and Quick Start collaborated on a project that is the first of its kind for biomanufacturing in Georgia: building an exact replica of Dendreon’s biologics laboratory inside Quick Start’s Atlanta production studio in order to capture images of the process that have never been documented before.
“We’ve needed a video like this,” says Donovan Farris, a Dendreon manager of manufacturing. “We have text that tells what we do, and flow diagrams, but nothing compares to seeing it done.”
The Quick Start team documented the lab simulation using high-definition video cameras, including a miniaturized unit mounted inside the lab equipment that captured close-ups of techniques that are essential for training Dendreon’s biomanufacturing workforce.
Seal Beach, California
Making the battle against cancer personal through immunotherapy treatments that extend lives.
Atlanta Technical College
“This is a dream come true for us.”
— Kim Morris, Dendreon manufacturing training associate
Dendreon clinical manufacturing team members Donovan Farris and Peter Gahn re-create the company’s sophisticated procedures for Quick Start’s cameras.
Farris and Hahn set out separation containers, wash containers, sample tubes, setting plates and labels in preparation to begin processing and filming.
Farris and Hahn review an antigen calculation form for Quick Start’s cameras.
During the five-day shoot, every step of Dendreon’s production process was conducted in Quick Start’s Atlanta studio and recorded from multiple angles.
The Quick Start team created this illustration that outlines Dendreon’s manufacturing process as part of an integrated multimedia training module for new employees.
