Celerion’s Hometown Roots Spread Across the World: How a long-time scientific presence in Lincoln, Nebraska helps to solve health issues on a global scale.
Established in 1933, Harris Laboratories was once a well-known name in Lincoln, Nebraska, providing laboratory services from its initiation and later evolving into one of the earliest providers of outsourced clinical trials work in the United States. Now, after nearly a century of scientific advancement and several name changes, this Nebraska laboratory has transitioned into Celerion’s global headquarters.
Who is Celerion?
Celerion is a world leader in early clinical research and bioanalytical testing services. We leverage decades of medical expertise and scientific solutions to help with the development of new, life-changing therapeutics. Our mission is to help our clients get their drugs to market faster thereby improving health outcomes for people around the globe.
Celerion offers a comprehensive range of early-phase clinical and bioanalytical services for investigative therapeutics including small molecules, biologics, and emerging modalities such as oligonucleotides, peptides, and cell and gene therapies. Our bioanalytical laboratories support our clients with pharmacokinetic, biomarker, immunogenicity, and specialty assay development and sample testing services for studies from pre-clinical through late phase clinical.
Alongside our bioanalytical strength, Celerion continues to execute complex first-in-human, drug-drug interaction, and bioequivalence clinical studies, integrating clinical operations with sophisticated data management, biostatistics, and regulatory reporting expertise.
What role does Celerion play in Nebraska’s scientific community?
Our Lincoln site is home to one of our largest clinical research facilities and to our main US bioanalytical laboratory. Our deep connection to Nebraska with its strong academic community and pool of talented scientists has played a crucial role in our ability to grow and innovate as an organization. Today, our Lincoln facilities are a cornerstone of our global network, providing high-quality data and scientific insight that drive decision-making for pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies worldwide.
Celerion is committed to fostering growth within Nebraska’s scientific community. Through partnerships with Southeast Community College, the University of Nebraska and other regional universities, we offer scholarships and hands-on opportunities for students pursuing careers in biotechnology and analytical sciences. Our Bioanalytical Analyst Progression Program provides structured training and career development for new graduates, ensuring continued professional growth within the organization. We also offer education reimbursement programs, encouraging employees to pursue advanced studies while contributing to our mission.
Beyond Nebraska, how large is Celerion’s footprint?
Celerion operates across North America, Europe, and Asia, with additional clinical facilities in Phoenix, Belfast, Montreal, and Vienna, and a European bioanalytical laboratory in Zurich. This global presence allows us to deliver consistent, high-quality data for our clients regardless of clinical trial location or regulatory requirements.
What are some of the current challenges in the healthcare industry that Celerion helps address?
Technological advancements have allowed drug developers to create novel drug modalities with more complex structures and/or activities. While these new approaches often provide promising results for difficult-to-treat diseases, they also require increasingly complex clinical and bioanalytical testing strategies.
Celerion is rising to this challenge by investing in new technologies, platforms, and approaches of their own. Our clinics and laboratories continue to adopt new methods to enable rapid and highly reproducible results for a wide range of biotherapeutic applications. We actively explore new systems, including AI tools, to streamline our processes and keep up with the increasingly truncated timelines for clinical trials. Our goal is to always deliver rapid solutions to our clients at the speed of science.
Any closing thoughts on the scientific industry in Nebraska that you would like to share?
Nebraska has a long history of scientific innovation and growth based around a strong academic system. At Celerion, our people are our greatest strength, and we have always relied heavily on the emerging scientific talent from within Nebraska’s networks. At Celerion, we are proud to call Nebraska home and look forward to another hundred years of engagement with our state’s top-tier scientific community.