Top 20 Contract Manufacturing Organizations In The USA

If you have ever wondered how a medicine or a supplement bottle actually gets made before it reaches a pharmacy shelf, there is a good chance a "CMO" was behind it. CMO stands for Contract Manufacturing Organization. In plain words, it is a company that other companies hire to make their products for them. A pharma brand might invent a drug, but instead of building its own factory, it pays a CMO to manufacture it under strict quality rules.

Think of it this way. A small biotech company might discover a new treatment in a lab, but turning that discovery into millions of safe, consistent doses requires specialized equipment, trained staff, and approvals from health authorities like the FDA. Building all of that in-house would take years and cost far more than most companies can afford, especially in the early stages. So instead, they turn to a CMO that already has the factories, the trained teams, and the regulatory experience ready to go.

The United States has some of the biggest and most trusted names in this business. Below is a simple, easy-to-follow list of 20 well-known CMOs (and CDMOs, which also help with drug development) that operate manufacturing sites in the USA. This list mixes pharmaceutical, biologics, and medical device contract manufacturers, since all of them fall under the same broad CMO idea: making products on behalf of someone else. The order below is not a ranking of quality; it is simply a helpful way to walk through the industry name by name.

1) Catalent

Catalent is one of the most recognized names in contract manufacturing, headquartered in Somerset, New Jersey. It makes everything from tablets and capsules to complex biologics and gene therapies, and it is especially known for its drug delivery technology, including softgel capsules and modified-release formulations that help drugs work better in the body. 

In late 2024, Catalent was acquired by Novo Holdings, the investment arm connected to Novo Nordisk, which has brought fresh investment into its US plants. The company also plays a big role in cell and gene therapy manufacturing, an area that has grown quickly as more advanced treatments move through clinical trials and into approval. 

Its US network includes multiple sites handling everything from early development batches to full commercial-scale production, which makes it a common choice for both large pharmaceutical companies and smaller biotech firms that need a flexible, one-stop manufacturing partner.

Novo Holdings acquiring Catalent is one deal.

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2) Thermo Fisher Scientific (Patheon)

Thermo Fisher, based in Waltham, Massachusetts, runs its contract manufacturing business under the Patheon brand, which it gained through an earlier acquisition. It offers a huge range of services, including sterile injectables, oral solid dosage drugs, biologics, and clinical trial supplies, across many facilities in the US and abroad. 

What sets Thermo Fisher apart is the sheer size of its overall business, since contract manufacturing is just one part of a much larger company that also makes lab equipment, testing instruments, and scientific supplies. This scale gives it strong purchasing power, deep regulatory experience, and the ability to support a drug all the way from an early lab test to full commercial manufacturing. 

The company has also been expanding its sterile fill-finish capacity in the US, including through the acquisition of additional injectable manufacturing sites, to meet rising demand for complex biologic and specialty drugs.

3) Lonza

Lonza is a Swiss company, but it has a strong manufacturing footprint inside the US, including sites in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and Houston, Texas. It focuses heavily on biologics, viral vectors used in gene therapy, and small-molecule drug ingredients. 

Lonza is widely seen as one of the market leaders in viral vector manufacturing, a highly specialized process used to deliver gene therapies into patient cells, and it has been steadily expanding this capacity to meet growing demand from biotech companies working on cutting-edge treatments. 

The company also picked up a large-scale biologics manufacturing site through an acquisition, adding even more commercial production capacity on American soil. Because of its size and long history in the industry, Lonza is often chosen by companies that need a partner capable of scaling a product from a small clinical trial batch all the way up to full global commercial supply.

4) Fujifilm Diosynth Biotechnologies

This company, part of the Japanese Fujifilm group, has become a major biologics manufacturer in the US, with a large hub in the Research Triangle area of North Carolina. It has been investing billions of dollars into expanding cell culture and gene therapy manufacturing capacity there, positioning itself as one of the fastest-growing biologics CDMOs in the country. 

The North Carolina site has become a focal point for large, multi-year manufacturing partnerships with major biopharma companies, reflecting a broader industry trend of bringing more biologics production onto US soil. Fujifilm Diosynth mainly works with mammalian cell culture technology, a common method for producing therapeutic proteins and antibodies, and it also supports viral vector and vaccine manufacturing. 

Its continued expansion in the US is often pointed to as an example of how global companies are choosing to build up American manufacturing capacity rather than relying only on facilities overseas.

5) Boehringer Ingelheim Biopharmaceuticals

Boehringer Ingelheim, a German pharmaceutical company, runs biologics manufacturing operations in the US, including a site in Fremont, California. It specializes in producing antibodies and other biologic medicines for partner companies around the world. 

Unlike some CMOs that only handle manufacturing, Boehringer Ingelheim brings decades of its own in-house drug development experience to the table, since it is also a major pharmaceutical company in its own right with its own branded medicines. This gives its contract manufacturing clients access to deep process knowledge built from developing and producing its own biologic drugs. 

The company generally focuses on mammalian cell culture-based biologics manufacturing, and it has continued to invest in upgrading its US facilities to keep pace with the growing demand for antibody-based therapies used to treat conditions like cancer and autoimmune diseases.

6) AGC Biologics

AGC Biologics, a subsidiary of Japan's AGC Group, has a key US manufacturing hub in Bothell, Washington. The company focuses on biologics such as therapeutic proteins and antibodies, supporting drug makers from early clinical trials through full commercial production. 

It offers a fairly broad range of services under one roof, including cell line development, process development, and both clinical and commercial manufacturing, which means a client can potentially stay with AGC Biologics for the entire journey of a drug rather than moving between different partners at each stage. 

The company has also been building out its capabilities in cell and gene therapy manufacturing, an area where demand has grown quickly. Because AGC Biologics is part of a larger, well-established Japanese industrial group, it also benefits from strong financial backing to support long-term facility investments in the US.

7) Curia

Curia, formerly known as AMRI, is headquartered in Albany, New York. It offers both drug development and manufacturing services, covering everything from small-molecule chemistry to biologics, and has multiple manufacturing sites spread across the United States. 

The company built its reputation over many years as a chemistry-focused CDMO, helping pharmaceutical companies produce active pharmaceutical ingredients and complex intermediates used in drug synthesis. Over time, it broadened its services to include biologics and more advanced modalities as well. 

Curia has also been involved in some notable site transactions in recent years, including selling one of its facilities to another CDMO looking to establish a US manufacturing base, which shows how actively companies in this space trade and reorganize their manufacturing networks. Its long history and broad chemistry expertise make it a familiar name for companies working on small-molecule drugs.

8) Cambrex

Cambrex is a US-based CDMO with its headquarters in East Rutherford, New Jersey. It has manufacturing plants in states like North Carolina and Iowa, and it mainly focuses on producing active pharmaceutical ingredients, which are the core chemical components inside a drug. 

Cambrex has built a strong reputation specifically in small-molecule chemistry, meaning it is often chosen by companies that need help scaling up complex chemical synthesis processes safely and consistently. Beyond just producing the active ingredient, Cambrex also offers finished dosage form manufacturing, so it can support a drug from the raw chemistry stage through to the final tablet or capsule. 

Being headquartered and largely operating within the United States also makes it an attractive option for companies that specifically want a domestic supply chain for regulatory, cost, or supply-security reasons.

9) Emergent BioSolutions

Emergent BioSolutions, headquartered in Gaithersburg, Maryland, is known for manufacturing vaccines and other biologic products, including work with government health agencies. It runs manufacturing facilities such as one in Baltimore, Maryland, that have supported large-scale vaccine production. 

A notable part of Emergent's identity is its close relationship with public health and biodefense work, since it has historically manufactured products related to national health security stockpiles in addition to standard commercial biologics. This background gives the company deep experience with the kind of large-scale, tightly regulated production needed during public health emergencies. 

Emergent also offers sterile fill-finish services, which is the process of filling vials or syringes with a finished biologic drug under strict sterile conditions, making it a useful partner for vaccine and biologic developers who need this specialized final manufacturing step.

10) Grifols

Grifols is a Spanish healthcare company, but it operates significant manufacturing plants inside the United States, including one in Clayton, North Carolina. It is best known for plasma-based medicines, though it also supports broader biopharmaceutical manufacturing work. 

Plasma-derived medicines are used to treat a range of serious conditions, including immune disorders and certain rare diseases, and producing them requires a very specific type of manufacturing process that not every CDMO offers. 

Grifols runs a large network of plasma collection centers across the US that feed directly into its American manufacturing plants, giving it a fairly self-contained supply chain from donation to finished product. This combination of collection and manufacturing infrastructure inside the US is one of the things that sets Grifols apart from many other companies on this list.

11) Pfizer CentreOne

Pfizer CentreOne is the contract manufacturing division of Pfizer itself. Instead of only making Pfizer's own medicines, this arm allows other pharmaceutical and biotech companies to use Pfizer's US manufacturing expertise and facilities for their own drug products. 

This is a fairly unique setup compared to most of the other companies on this list, since Pfizer CentreOne is backed by the resources, quality systems, and regulatory relationships of one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world. It offers services across sterile injectables, oral solid dosage forms, and active pharmaceutical ingredient manufacturing, along with specialized capabilities like high-potency drug handling. 

For smaller biotech companies, partnering with Pfizer CentreOne can provide access to manufacturing know-how that would otherwise take a major pharmaceutical company years to build internally.

12) Baxter BioPharma Solutions

Baxter BioPharma Solutions, part of the larger Baxter International company based in Deerfield, Illinois, focuses on sterile injectable drug manufacturing. It helps pharmaceutical companies with filling and finishing injectable medicines, which requires very high standards of cleanliness and precision. 

Because Baxter's core business has long revolved around hospital and medical products, its contract manufacturing division carries that same emphasis on sterile, patient-ready products, including vials, pre-filled syringes, and other injectable delivery formats. This makes it a common choice for companies developing injectable biologics or specialty drugs that cannot be taken as a simple tablet. 

Baxter's long-standing relationships with hospitals and healthcare systems also mean its manufacturing processes are built around the kind of consistency and reliability that the medical field depends on every day.

13) Societal CDMO

Societal CDMO, formerly known as Recro Pharma, runs manufacturing plants in Gainesville, Georgia, and Rockford, Illinois. It specializes in oral solid dose and controlled-release medicines, and mainly supports smaller and mid-sized pharmaceutical companies with their manufacturing needs. 

Controlled-release technology is a way of designing a tablet or capsule so that it releases its medicine slowly over time instead of all at once, which can help patients take fewer doses per day. Societal CDMO has built a good part of its business around this kind of specialized formulation work. 

Because it tends to focus on smaller and mid-sized clients rather than the largest global pharmaceutical companies, it is often seen as a more accessible option for emerging companies that need a manufacturing partner willing to work closely with them on smaller batch sizes and more personalized service.

14) Alcami Corporation

Alcami is headquartered in Wilmington, North Carolina, and offers both manufacturing and laboratory testing services. It works with companies developing oral solid dosage products, sterile products, and packaging solutions, and it is a fully US-based operation. 

One thing that makes Alcami a bit different from some CDMOs is how closely it pairs manufacturing with analytical testing, meaning it can both produce a drug and run the quality testing needed to confirm it meets required standards, all under one company. This combination can be especially useful for smaller pharmaceutical companies that do not have their own in-house testing labs. 

Alcami also offers packaging and labeling services, which are the final steps before a product is ready to ship, rounding out its ability to support a drug from manufacturing through to a market-ready package.

15) Evonik Health Care

Evonik, a German specialty chemicals company, runs a health care division that manufactures drug delivery systems in the US. It is particularly known for its work on lipid nanoparticles, a technology that became widely known through its use in mRNA vaccines, where it helps protect and deliver fragile genetic material safely into the body. 

Beyond lipid nanoparticles, Evonik also works on other advanced drug delivery approaches, including systems for oral and injectable medicines that need to release their active ingredient in a very specific way. Its background as a specialty chemicals company gives it deep material science expertise, which is a valuable and fairly specialized skill set in the CDMO world. 

Companies working on next-generation therapies, including mRNA-based treatments beyond vaccines, often look to partners like Evonik for this kind of formulation science.

16) CordenPharma

CordenPharma operates a manufacturing site in Boulder, Colorado, as part of its global network. The company focuses on producing active pharmaceutical ingredients and finished drug products, working with pharmaceutical companies on both small-scale and large commercial batches. 

CordenPharma organizes its business around specific technology platforms, such as peptides, lipids, and injectable products, rather than trying to be a generalist across every possible drug type. This kind of focused specialization can be an advantage for companies whose drug happens to fall into one of these categories, since it means working with a team that has deep, concentrated expertise in that exact area. 

The Boulder site plays a role within this larger global network, giving CordenPharma's US clients access to the same specialized technology platforms used at its facilities elsewhere in the world.

17) Almac Group

Almac Group, originally established in Northern Ireland, has built a strong presence in the United States through its advanced facilities, including a major site in Souderton, Pennsylvania. The company serves pharmaceutical and biotechnology organizations by providing a broad range of contract development and manufacturing services across the drug development lifecycle. 

Its capabilities include clinical trial supply manufacturing, packaging, labeling, storage, distribution, and logistics for investigational medicines used in global clinical studies. Almac also offers pharmaceutical development, analytical testing, formulation support, and commercial manufacturing for selected products. 

By combining scientific expertise with reliable supply chain management, the company helps clients accelerate development timelines, maintain regulatory compliance, and ensure clinical materials reach research sites efficiently, supporting successful drug development programs worldwide.

18) Siegfried

Siegfried is a Switzerland-based contract development and manufacturing organization that has strengthened its presence in the United States through the acquisition of a manufacturing facility in Albuquerque, New Mexico, previously owned by Curia. This expansion provides the company with a dedicated American production base to better serve pharmaceutical customers across North America. 

Siegfried specializes in the development and manufacturing of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs), intermediates, and finished dosage forms for both branded and generic medicines. Its services also include process development, scale-up, formulation development, analytical support, and commercial manufacturing. 

By integrating its US operations with its global manufacturing network, Siegfried helps pharmaceutical companies secure reliable production capacity, maintain quality standards, and efficiently supply medicines to international markets while meeting regulatory requirements.

19) Integer Holdings

Integer Holdings, headquartered in Plano, Texas, is one of the largest contract manufacturers serving the global medical device industry. Rather than producing pharmaceutical drugs, the company specializes in designing and manufacturing highly engineered medical device components and complete devices for leading healthcare brands. 

Its expertise covers products used in cardiac rhythm management, neuromodulation, vascular intervention, electrophysiology, orthopedic applications, and advanced surgical procedures. Integer also provides precision engineering, research support, product development, manufacturing, and supply chain solutions that help customers bring innovative medical technologies to market. 

With multiple manufacturing facilities and extensive technical capabilities, the company enables medical device manufacturers to improve product quality, maintain regulatory compliance, increase production efficiency, and deliver reliable healthcare solutions to patients around the world.

20) Jabil Healthcare

Jabil Healthcare, a division of Jabil headquartered in St. Petersburg, Florida, provides comprehensive contract manufacturing solutions for the healthcare industry. While Jabil is widely recognized for its global electronics manufacturing expertise, its healthcare division focuses on supporting medical device, diagnostic, and pharmaceutical companies with high-quality manufacturing and engineering services. 

The company offers product design assistance, prototype development, precision manufacturing, assembly, testing, sterilization support, packaging, and supply chain management for complex healthcare products. Its capabilities extend to diagnostic instruments, surgical devices, drug delivery systems, and digital health technologies. 

Through advanced manufacturing technologies, strict quality management systems, and global production capacity, Jabil Healthcare helps customers efficiently scale production, meet regulatory requirements, reduce operational complexity, and deliver innovative medical products to healthcare providers and patients worldwide.

20 companies is one list.

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→ Read: Pharmaceutical Contract Manufacturing Market 2026: Top CDMOs, Growth Trends & Strategic Shifts

Final Thoughts

This list is not a strict ranking from best to worst, since different CMOs are strong in different areas. Some are better suited for biologics, some for tablets and capsules, and some for medical devices. 

What matters most for a business looking to partner with one of these companies is matching their specific manufacturing needs, whether that is sterile injectables, gene therapy, or simple oral medicines, with the CMO's actual area of expertise.

Whether you are a student learning about the pharmaceutical supply chain, a business researching manufacturing partners, or simply curious about how medicines are made, this list gives a simple starting point into one of the most important, yet often overlooked, parts of the healthcare industry. 

The next time you pick up a prescription or read about a new vaccine rolling out, there is a fair chance one of these twenty companies played a quiet but essential role in making sure it reached you safely.

FAQs

1. What Is A Contract Manufacturing Organization (CMO)?

A Contract Manufacturing Organization (CMO) is a company that manufactures pharmaceutical products, medical devices, or supplements for other businesses. Instead of building and operating their own production facilities, companies partner with CMOs to produce products while meeting strict quality and regulatory standards. CMOs also help companies increase production capacity while maintaining consistent product quality and regulatory compliance.

2. What Is The Difference Between A CMO And A CDMO?

A CMO mainly focuses on manufacturing products, while a Contract Development and Manufacturing Organization (CDMO) offers both product development and manufacturing services. CDMOs can assist with formulation development, process optimization, clinical trial production, and commercial manufacturing under one roof. This makes CDMOs a suitable choice for companies looking for end-to-end support from development through commercial production.

3. Why Do Pharmaceutical Companies Use CMOs In The USA?

Pharmaceutical companies choose US-based CMOs because they provide advanced manufacturing facilities, experienced technical teams, and compliance with FDA regulations. Partnering with a CMO helps companies reduce costs, speed up production, scale manufacturing efficiently, and bring medicines to market faster without investing in their own manufacturing plants. Many companies also prefer US CMOs to strengthen supply chain reliability and support faster access to the North American market.