National Business Wire (Dec 1) -- Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis AG announced Friday that it will invest around $84 million in a new radiotherapy facility in China.

The radiotherapy facility will be in Haiyan County, east China's Zhejiang Province, with a total investment expected to exceed 600 million yuan ($84 million).

Novartis China said it expects the new facility to go into production by the end of 2026, subject to regulatory approvals for the relevant drugs.

Upon completion, the radiotherapy production base in Haiyan, will be Novartis' second innovative medicine production site in China.

The investment comes "to accelerate the pace of introducing innovative radioligand therapies into China for the benefit of domestic oncology patients with clinical needs," Novartis China said in a press release.

Novartis owns a plant in Beijing's Changping District, for which it laid the foundation stone in 1987, with a total investment of more than 700 million yuan.

(US$1 = 7.1445 yuan)