L.B. Bohle "Innovation Days" - Continuous Manufacturing and new Plant 4 arouse great interest in the pharmaceutical industry

Continuity, perseverance and innovative spirit pay off: Over the past few years, L.B. Bohle Maschinen und Verfahren GmbH has invested several million euros in the development of new machines and processes for the continuous production of pharmaceutical solids. "At the 2nd Innovation Days organised by L.B. Bohle and our partner, KORSCH AG, we will not only be talking about the latest developments. We will also be presenting the first complete system as a reference in our new Plant 4," said Managing Director Tim Remmert in his welcome address to the 90 participants on Wednesday.

Just a few years ago, many in the pharmaceutical industry considered Continuous Manufacturing, i.e. the continuous production of tablets, to be yet another technology that first aroused great expectations, was then hyped, but failed just as spectacularly in practice. "Many technologies have come and gone. But with Continuous Manufacturing, things turned out differently," reported Professor Peter Kleinebudde from Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf at the start of the two-day symposium.

"Plateau of productivity" reached
This technology also went through the usual curve of initial euphoria, high expectations, disillusionment, crash and abandonment by many players. However, according to the professor, the perseverance of innovation drivers such as L.B. Bohle has ensured that Continuous Manufacturing will reach a "plateau of productivity" on which the technology will now achieve a breakthrough. "The aim is not that the entire manufacturing process has to be 100 per cent continuous," explained Kleinebudde. It could also be just individual process steps. Depending on the product requirements, the degree of continuous production varies.

Dr Carsten Schmidt (Head of Drug Product Development, Merck Healthcare KGaA, Darmstadt) also emphasised the persistence, innovative spirit and short decision-making processes at L.B. Bohle as criteria for success. After an initial visit and discussions in 2016, Merck initially decided against a project with L.B. Bohle in 2017. "But Lorenz Bohle, Chairman of the Foundation at L.B. Bohle, stayed on personally. He wanted to know why we had made this decision," recalls Dr Schmidt. The feedback led to a constructive dialogue and the first prototype was tested in 2018. The experts were able to see the result of the further joint development work during the seminar: a complete production line for the continuous production of medicines.

Intensive exchange of knowledge
The centrepiece of the overall system is the QbCon® 1 from L.B. Bohle for Continuous Wet Granulation and Drying. Together with a mixing and dosing unit (Gericke AG), it is completely enclosed by an isolator from Franz Ziel GmbH. In addition, there is a Sieving unit from the BTS 100 series, an XL 100 WipCon® Tableting unit from KORSCH AG and a semi-continuous Coater KOCO® 25. The system is fed by two automated HS 400 Lifting Columns.

As part of the two-day Innovation Days, experts from other companies such as KORSCH AG, Gericke AG and Franz Ziel GmbH also presented the technical aspects of their specialised machines and their integration into continuous processes. At the end of the Innovation Days, host Tim Remmert and company founder Lorenz Bohle expressed their satisfaction with the intensive exchange of knowledge among the pharmaceutical experts. The Innovation Days format will certainly be continued in the future. "The response was consistently positive and we are very pleased to have not only informed the participants about our processes and systems, but also to have inspired them," concluded Tim Remmert.