3 minute read - 1st May 2020
Upperton invests £500,000 to increase manufacturing capacity
Upperton Pharma Solutions, a Nottingham-based contract development and manufacturing organisation, has invested £500,000 in significantly expanding its tablet manufacturing capabilities and strengthening the firm’s ability to support clients’ research, development and clinical manufacturing needs.
The investment includes the addition of tablet processing equipment for wet granulation, roller compaction, tablet compression, hardness testing, dedusting, weight sorting and tablet coating.
Tablets remain the most popular choice of dosage form, offering accurate administration for patients, convenient packing options, good chemical stability, and well-established, cost-effective manufacturing processes which produce consistent, quality products. Upperton’s recent investments in tablet equipment and technology means that the company is well placed to offer its clients scientific expertise combined with a wide range of scalable equipment to enable the development and manufacture of tablets.
Upperton Pharma has invested £500,000 in significantly expanding its tablet manufacturing capabilities / Picture: Upperton
The recently acquired equipment includes a Futorque Tablet machine from KG Pharma, a versatile tablet press with instrumentation and flexibility to be used for both R&D studies and clinical production runs; an O Hara Labcoat, a multi-pan coating system with interchangeable pans; and a Vector TFC roller compactor, a small-scale densification and dry granulation machine specifically designed to minimise product loss whilst producing compacted material using a range of process conditions. All the above are supported with a full range of ancillary equipment including weight sorting from CI Precision, dedusting, metal checking and in process testing from Kramer.
Paul Kelsall, director of clinical manufacture, said: “This suite of equipment has considerably expanded Upperton’s capabilities and scale with respect to tablets. It has enabled us to recently onboard a number of new tablet dosage form projects and provides us with enhanced capabilities to offer our clients a wide range of tablet processing options. We now have the tools to offer tablet as a dosage form to support client projects from early material characterisation, design of experiments concepts, first in human studies through to phase II clinical manufacture and technical transfer support.”
Upperton Pharma Solutions develops and produces oral and inhalation drug products for clinical trials and is able to optimise formulation performance through a science-led approach to projects.
Dr Richard Johnson, founder and chief executive, added: “This significant package of investment signals our commitment to continued growth and expansion of our services in order to meet the growing demands of our clients in oral solid dosage form development. It complements Upperton’s already established world class reputation for the use of spray drying as the principle enabling technology for poorly soluble compounds and ensures that we can support our client through the entire development process from early R&D to clinical supply.”