Honeywell (NYSE:HON) is touting its new Aclar Edge bottles and vials as a safer alternative to glass packaging for pharmaceutical products. Aclar Edge is meant for oral liquids for human health and sterile injectables for animal health applications. Honeywell said it has created the bottles and vials through its novel and proprietary multi-layer extrusion blow molding…
Sherlock Biosciences announces manufacturing partnership for CRISPR-based COVID-19 test
Sherlock Biosciences announced today that it will collaborate with Integrated DNA Technologies (IDT) to enable large-scale manufacturing of the Sherlock CRISPR SARS-CoV-2 kit for COVID-19 detection. Officials at Cambridge, Mass.–based Sherlock Biosciences think the company’s CRISPR-based diagnostic test, which recently received an FDA emergency use authorization, will increase testing capacity and decreasing time to result…
Merck eyes tiny patches as a vaccine delivery method
Merck has exercised its option to use Vaxxas‘ High Density Microarray Patch (HD-MAP) platform as a delivery platform for a vaccine candidate, the companies announced today. The companies did not disclose what the vaccine candidate is supposed to treat. But Merck this month announced two COVID-19 vaccine development efforts: a collaboration with IAVI and plans…
Thermo Fischer Scientific to boost manufacturing for CSL
Thermo Fischer Scientific announced today that it has inked a strategic partnership with biotechnology company CSL to help better meet the growing demand for biologic therapies. Thermo Fisher will support CSL’s product portfolio through its pharma services network, including drug product development, biologics manufacturing, sterile fill-finish, packaging and clinical trials logistics. Thermo Fisher — through…
Siemens Healthineers to produce 50m antibody tests per month against COVID-19
Siemens Healthineers (ETR: SHL) said today that it has started worldwide shipments of its COVID-19 antibody test, with a goal of producing 50 million tests per month as the pandemic evolves. The German medtech giant boasts that it has 20,000 systems worldwide to run the tests, including what it describes as the largest analyzer installed base in the…
Mass-producing a COVID-19 vaccine is going to be hard
Creating a safe and effective COVID-19 vaccine is just the first step. Recent media reports suggest that making it will also be a major challenge. There are presently a number of vaccine candidates around the world that are showing promise and entering the clinical studies phase — a speed of development usually unheard of in…
ACG receives Clean Label Project certification for capsules
ACG (Mumbai, India) announced today that the nonprofit Clean Label Project has certified its ACGcaps H+. Clean Label Project certification signifies that a product has met strict and comprehensive testing to demonstrate a priority on purity and environmental sustainability, according to ACG. The nonprofit evaluates test results against California Proposition 65, which is meant to…
Pfizer to outsource more production as it prepares for COVID-19 vaccine
Pfizer is turning to its 200-strong network of outside contractors to make more of its existing medicines as it prepares for a potential COVID-19 vaccine, according to media reports. The New York–based pharmaceutical giant said May 5 that it will invest at-risk to produce millions of doses of a coronavirus vaccine in 2020, boosting production…
India-led research effort asks the question: How do we keep a potential COVID-19 vaccine cold?
U.K. scientists have joined a research effort in India to help solve distribution problems around whatever COVID-19 vaccine hopefully emerges from global efforts, according to a recent news release from the University of Birmingham. Backed by the Shakti Sustainable Energy Foundation, experts from the University of Birmingham and Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh are investigating the challenge involved…
Quartic.ai, Bright Path Labs to develop AI-powered continuous manufacturing for APIs
Quartic.ai and Bright Path Labs announced today that they’ve agreed to develop an AI-powered continuous manufacturing platform for active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) and other small molecule drugs. The technology will use Bright Path Labs’ continuous bioreactor and the Quartic.ai smart manufacturing technology. The companies are touting the technology as a way to diversify supplies of APIs, many…