Six companies were named as INTERPHEX Exhibitor Award winners today as the 2018 International Pharmaceutical Expo got underway at the Javits Center in New York City.
INTERPHEX, the premier pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and medical device development and manufacturing event, is sponsored by the Parenteral Drug Association (PDA). The show runs through Thursday, April 19.
The top exhibitor honors went to Vanrx Pharmasystems; Nymi Inc.; LifeAire Systems; Millipore Sigma; Steris Life Sciences, and Groninger USA LLC.
The awards program, sponsored by Pharmaceutical Processing, was established to recognize companies that showcase creative technologies and/or new strategies and services that have significantly improved pharma and biopharma development and manufacturing.
Companies competed in six categories: Best in Show; Best New Product/Service; Editor’s Choice; Best Technological Innovation; INTERPHEX Efficiency Champion, and Biotech Innovation.
This year’s winners by category are:
Best in Show: Vanrx Pharmasystems (Booth No. 3805)
Microcell Vial Filler
The Microcell Vial Filler fills an unmet need early in the drug product supply chain. It enables drug development functions (formulation, toxicology, stability, etc.) to happen earlier in a drug product’s lifecycle. This saves time in pre-clinical and clinical development, saving time in the patent window, and helping users reach the market faster. In the personalized medicines space, the Microcell allows safe and rapid scale-out of clinical and commercial manufacturing. As a standard design, it can be built quickly, allowing companies to add more validated capacity in months, rather than years. Robotic automation and single-use product contact materials eliminate the risks of manual filling (human error) and cross-contamination, respectively.
The Best in Show award recognizes accomplishments and display in the use of knowledge, innovation, and state-of-the-art technologies to achieve extraordinary levels of quality, production goals, and objectives—ultimately transforming critical and affordable life-enhancing ideas to finished drug products.
Best New Product/Service: Nymi Inc. (Booth No. 1373
Nymi Band
The Nymi Band benefits manufacturers, workers, and regulatory bodies alike.
Manufacturers now have a tool that creates an environment of non-repudiation. Having the ability to trust the data being produced by the thousands of logs produced every day, at a single facility gives the manufacturer the ability to avoid costly audits, and steer clear of regulatory concerns in the case something does happen along the manufacturing chain. Also, due to the Nymi Band being faster at logging actions into the system, there is an efficiency gain across the board. Higher security and adherence to regulatory, and more savings through an increase in efficiency. Combine this with the product providing less friction than current authentication methods, and greater control for IT teams with both physical and logical access, and the Nymi Band manages to satisfy all of the various parties involved, in a way not yet achieved by current methods.
The Best New Product/Service award is given to the exhibitor that encourages, develops, and features the very best in new products or services showcasing knowledge, innovation, and state-of-the-art technologies leading to significant business, economic, or manufacturing benefits for the pharma and bio industries.
Editor’s Choice (sponsored by Pharmaceutical Processing): LifeAire Systems (Booth No. 1571)
The LifeAir System (Credit: LifeAir Systems LLC; www.lifeair.com)
The LifeAire System removes up to 99.99 percent of biological and chemical contaminants, resulting in an air purity level that only LifeAire guarantees. It improves outcomes, including a significant increase in productivity and reduction in batch loss, while enhancing product integrity and improving ROI, especially important for biological and pharmaceutical manufacturers. Air change rates can be significantly reduced (15-20 exchanges in the system versus 60-90 exchanges in a HEPA-only system) resulting in significant reduction in energy and HVAC operating costs. In addition, the system eliminates cross-contamination, a concern in cell/gene therapy R&D and manufacturing.
This Editor’s Choice award recognizes and honors the exhibiting company that, in the view of the Pharmaceutical Processing editor, best demonstrates knowledge, innovation, and technologies within the pharma and biopharma industries.
Best Technological Innovation: Millipore Sigma (Booth No. 2841)
Millistak+ HC Pro
The Millistak+ HC Pro synthetic depth filters can decrease cycle time to produce and release product. These depth filters reduce TOC extractables and provide a 50 percent reduction in the recommended pre-use flush volume. Recent advancements in the productivity of upstream cell culture processes requires higher filtration capacities, exceeding the capabilities of the naturally derived filters currently available. As the first fully synthetic depth filters for primary and secondary clarification, the Millistak+® HC Pro portfolio provides as much as twice the filtration capacity in primary clarification applications versus commercial DE-based bench marks, and offers biopharmaceutical manufacturers an improved consistency that will help them design a more robust and controlled clarification process.
The Best Technological Innovation award recognizes cutting-edge technologies, either new technologies or a novel implementation of existing technologies, that have the potential to change the way pharma/bio companies operate.
INTERPHEX Efficiency Champion: Steris Life Sciences (Booth No. 3121)
STERIS VHP DC-A
The STERIS VHP DC-A is the new generation of vaporized hydrogen peroxide decontamination chambers for material transfer of materials, components and material bags into aseptic manufacturing cleanroom areas. The new product decontaminates surfaces of transfer material loads under room temperature and atmospheric conditions and minimizes particulate burden effectively that would otherwise transfer to the cleanroom side along with the unloading. Key elements are increased safety of materials being transferred, as the VHP concentrations per cycle are minimized by true continuous process control. This is also a true stand-alone equipment that does not need any HVAC connections. So, this contributes to savings in validation and adds to processing environment and operator safety. In a nutshell: true alternative to manual wiping during material transfer by conventional airlock. Bioburden and particulate control, enhanced operator safety, minimizes peroxide consumption and sterilant exposure.
The INTERPHEX Efficiency Champion award is given to an exhibitor whose product or service understands the need for integrated efficiencies in processes and supports the fast pacing of the pharma/bio industry—whether in research, development, or commercial-scale production.
Biotech Innovation: Groninger USA LLC (Booth Nos. 3611)
FlexPro 50
The FlexPro 50 can be built with fully automated process steps according to requirements. This gives maximum process safety in aseptic fill /finish reducing the risk at human intervention. Ready-To-Use vials, cartridges, and syringes can be processed on one-line configuration by changing format parts (no trolley exchange); additional flexibility is given by exchanging the machine trolleys to process also vials in trays or in bulk in the same line configuration. The isolator works independently of the facility´s HVAC system—the entire technical equipment is built in the isolator with an overall height of less than 3 meters. Hand gloves on front and back of the main and add-on isolators allow machine access from both sides. Setting up filling paths, handling of environmental monitoring and introducing components can be done without using tools. A new direct-injection-system reduces the decontamination cycle by 50 percent. The line can be changed to process different products in two hours.
The Biotech Innovation award acknowledges an exhibitor’s innovative application to a given product or service that not only addresses an industry need but does so in such a way as to exceed previous standards or applications—thereby making the given process simpler, smoother, or easier to navigate.
The INTERPHEX Exhibit Award Judges
The judges on this year’s Exhibitor Awards panel were Joyceann Garippa, Editorial Director, Design Engineering & Manufacturing Groups, Advantage Business Media; David Hall, Vice President of Sales, Parenteral Drug Association (PDA), Christa Myers, Associate/Lead Process Engineering, CRB; and Barry Holtz, Principal, Holtz Biopharma Consulting.
INTERPHEX represents the future of pharmaceutical, biotech, and device development and manufacturing innovation, offering access to new business trends and strategies, cutting-edge technical sessions and state-of-the-art technologies, products, and services to reduce costs, increase productivity, and maximize efficiency.
INTERPHEX 2018 is taking place April 17-19 at the Javits Center in New York City.
