2 minute read - 18th January 2024
Upperton to expand operations with £5m investment
Upperton Pharma Solutions, a specialist contract development and manufacturing firm, is investing £5m to expand its Nottingham-based operations.
After completing the build and qualification of a new 50,000 sq ft GMP facility during 2023, the firm will now further expand its Trent Gateway site to include sterile capabilities with a purpose-built facility designed specifically in line with the revised EU GMP Annex-1 regulations.
The £5m investment into an additional 7,000 sq ft sterile manufacturing facility follows a period of significant growth in demand for the formulation development and manufacture of sterile and terminally sterilised products.
The facility build is scheduled to begin in February this year with the facility commissioning and validation to be completed in early Q4 2024. This investment in sterile drug product manufacturing enhances its existing service offering, which provides formulation development across a broad range of dosage forms, clinical trial supply, and niche-scale commercial manufacture for non-sterile dosage forms.
Upperton Pharma Solutions is to make a £5m investment to expand operations at its Trent Gateway facility in Nottingham / Picture: Upperton
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Nikki Whitfield, CEO of Upperton Pharma Solutions, said: “This investment addresses a real shortage within our industry of providers of small batches of sterile drug products to support early clinical trials. Given our existing formulation development and analytical capabilities, it represents a natural progression for Upperton and an exciting milestone in our growth plans.
“Our leadership team fully understand the challenges of getting our clients from pre-clinical to early phase clinical studies quickly, whilst maintaining quality and regulatory compliance. The combined experience of our leadership team in sterile facility builds and subsequent operations ensures that we will enter this new market with confidence.”
The new sterile facility will use advanced VHP isolation technology and carry out GMP fill-finish of sterile drug products for biologics and small molecules, making use of existing full-service formulation development and quality control labs. The facility will support the manufacturing of aseptic and terminally sterilised small volume liquids for parenteral, ocular and pulmonary delivery.
