Leading outsourcing provider PCI Pharma Services (PCI) is proud to announce further investment in bespoke labelling technology at its Hay-on-Wye site, Wales, UK.
With the breakthroughs in advanced therapies and specialized medicines in pharmaceutical industry PCI has experienced a surge in demand for more specialized packaging and labeling services. These advances often involve sterile and biological products with parenteral delivery forms that may include prefilled syringes which operate with safety devices, autoinjectors and pen devices. Due to the complex nature of these delivery forms, historical practices for labeling activities might employ manual process – however this can introduce a number of inefficiencies and opportunities for introduction of human error.
As a center of excellence for clinical and commercial packaging, PCI’s Hay-on-Wye site is always seeking to improve on the services offered and provide innovative market-leading solutions based on customer need. Recognizing the market trend for more specialized packaging and labeling services, PCI partnered with Marchesini Group to develop a bespoke, automated labeling solution. Building on an existing labeler and using a proportion of standard modules, Marchesini designed a custom-built technology delivering the automated solution requested by PCI to effectively meet customer demand.
Marchesini is a market leader for manufacturing pharmaceutical packaging equipment and a proven partner to PCI for a range of packaging equipment including Serialization technology. It is this partnership approach that led to the successful design, development and delivery of the important labeling technology able to handle both standard and custom-molded syringes as well as autoinjectors.
The new labeler was built to achieve EU, FDA and Japanese quality standards for PCI production and includes a full vision control system for identification of defects and positional errors. The flexible technology also boasts a custom-built infeed to allow for the manual placement of fragile devices, yet is still able to achieve considerable throughput for increased market demand. PCI’s expanding parenteral packaging solutions are supported by extensive onsite Cold Chain storage at the Hay facility.
Colin White, PCI’s Managing Director at Hay-on-Wye, commented: “Following a comprehensive review of potential suppliers, Marchesini was appointed for this project based on both our existing relationship combined with its reputation as market leaders in this field. The excellent working partnership between the PCI and Marchesini teams led to the design and construction of the equipment being completed in only nine months from start to finish.”
Colin continued: “As this is a completely bespoke technology, we are rightly proud that it is the only one that exists in any CDMO globally, meaning we really are able to offer best-in-class solutions for our customers. The high number of enquiries we have already received reflects the clear market demand for such advanced labeling solutions.”
The equipment will be fully validated and operational at PCI’s Hay-on-Wye facility by September 2017 and follows a number of investments by PCI in expanding its support for biologic medicines and parenteral delivery forms, including a 500 pallet expansion that effectively doubles its Cold Chain storage at its Philadelphia headquarters and commercial packaging facility. The installation complements PCI’s extensive Cold Chain support at its Rockford facility, itself offering more than 1,000 pallet locations of Cold Chain storage for biotech and temperature controlled medicines.
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