Astellas Canada is celebrating 20 years of life-changing medical research and development in 2025. The pharmaceutical company was formed in 2005 with the merger of Fujisawa Pharmaceutical and Yamanouchi Pharmaceuticals. Astellas Canada entered the Canadian market in 1989 under the Fujisawa banner. At the time, it was the first Japanese-based pharmaceutical company to open an office in Canada.
Sandra Heller recently joined Astellas Canada as its General Manager after spending 25 years working in the industry. She says the company’s name reflects its mission to improve people’s lives.
“Astellas expresses the idea of ‘aspired stars’ and comes from the Latin, Greek, and English words for stars. It also sounds like the Japanese phrase ‘a-su wo te-ra-su,’ which means ‘make tomorrow shine,’” says Heller. “I find it quite poetic when you're thinking about pharmaceutical companies and where we are developing products to help patients, families, and caregivers have a better tomorrow.”
Astellas legacy therapeutic areas include oncology and transplantation. Heller says hearing the impact their products have in people’s lives has been inspiring.
“We recently went to the University Health Network, and just to hear the sheer number of patients that have received a transplant or been supported through some of our products, whose lives have changed, was amazing,” she says.
One of Astellas' focus has been on oncology, which attracted Heller to the company. Heller says that while oncology continues to be a focus, including an upcoming new gastric cancer product, the company is expanding to look at different therapeutic areas. One of those areas is women’s health, one Heller says has been traditionally underserved.
“As a woman and mother of three daughters, it's an area that's always of interest to me. Women haven't always been included in clinical trials, so, it's very important to make sure that we're moving a lot of that development forward,” she says.
While neighboring Mississauga is known as “Pill Hill” for its density of pharmaceutical companies, Heller says Astellas’ Markham home gives it an edge in recruiting top talent from a wider area.
“Being in Markham differentiates us as an organization because we're able to pull talent from a different area. We’re not competing with those companies because we can look across the GTA. We’re also close to York University, which we have a close partnership with,” says Heller.
Astellas Canada provides sales, marketing, and customer support across Canada. Since joining Astellas last year, its team has grown from 90 employees to over 130.
“We are still expecting to continue to bring in some more talent in the months to come,” she says.
Heller says the people of Astellas Canada inspire her every day. Every employee has five days per year they can take off to do charitable work. In addition to the volunteer time, Astellas’ offices worldwide celebrate Changing Tomorrow Day, its signature volunteer event. The Astellas Canada team has partnered with the Centre for Dreams in Markham to support its mission of helping people with intellectual and developmental disabilities lead independent lives.
“It is an amazing organization that supports adults with developmental disabilities. Not only do we go and interact with the members of the Center for Dreams, but we roll up our sleeves, too,” Heller says. “We help them to do all the things that are on that extended to do list that nobody has time for—we clean, we paint, we build.”
Giving back is a core part of the Astellas Canada team, and Heller says she sees it in everything they do.
“The number one thing that I can say about Astellas is the people. You see us working together trying to make sure we're doing everything we can for patients, whether that’s trying to get medications to patients earlier or looking at opportunities to help to educate patients, there's very much a sense of not leaving a single stone unturned, and that's something that you don't often see.”
Visit astellas.com to learn more about its people and mission.
