Piramal has started work at its new state-of –the-art solid dose formulations development centre at Ahmedabad, India. Set up over 50,000 square feet of space, the centre is located in the Pharma Special Economic Zone (SEZ) in the industrial state of Gujarat.Focussing on solid dose development, the centre in its first phase will be staffed by 85 scientists including 40 formulators and 45 analysts. Piramal expect the staffing levels to increase to 150 scientists by the fourth quarter of 2009. Scientists will work in two shift operations at the development centre and be able to reduce project execution timelines and also be accessible to our customers across different time zones. While development work has already started, GMP operations are expected to start from March 2009.
The centre provides a suite of services and has been equipped with the latest equipment to support formulation development, robustness studies and GMP supply to support upto Phase II trials.
The Centre has 10 GMP suites with dedicated Air Handling Units and has the capacity to add another 10 suites in a short time span . Additional features include a dedicated High potency suite capable of handling substances up to 1 .g/m3 exposure levels and a dedicated Low Humidity rooms with < 20% RH for development of effervescent products and hygroscopic API handling.
Being part of the Pharma Special Economic Zone (SEZ) in Ahmedabad provides the centre tax incentives and waiver of import duty for materials and equipment, thereby ensuring long term competitiveness. The Ahmedabad operations also perfectly dovetail with Piramal’s capabilities for Preformulations studies at Mumbai and scale up and commercial supply from FDA approved site of Pithampur.
Source: Piramal Healthcare Limited