GE Healthcare installs purification tech at FujiFilm Diosynth site
The project – which involved integrating an AKTA purification system with bioreactors installed at the facility a few years back – was completed in just over a year according to a GE spokeswoman, who told us the timescale fitted Fujifilm need to increase capacity.
“The objective was to duplicate and mirror FujiFilm’s existing production capacity in North Carolina, USA to Billingham” she said, adding that the contract manufacturing organization (CMO) had seen an increase in demand from customers with drugs in trials.
“FujiFilm Diosynth needed a solution that would allow them to quickly turnaround larger numbers of smaller batches. The key was to create the right capacity for their customers that is both flexible and efficient.”
The project was not a full-blown “FlexFactory” - which is GE’s bespoke modular plant technologies that have recently adopted by firms like BeiGene, Gallus, JHL Biotech and Nanotherapeutics.
Rather it consisted of several separate installations of technologies. The facility houses technologies spanning the full range of upstream and downstream bioprocessing operations.
Single-use
Single-use technologies are core to the plant according to the GE spokeswoman.
She told us: “FujiFilm Diosynth have been early adopters of single-use technologies, so they had experience and confidence running a single-use facility and its production processes. As a result, GE helped FujiFilm Diosynth to design their new facility around single-use technologies.”
