Testa Center Automates Pharmaceutical Innovation

“Adaptability and scalability are essential facets of any contemporary life sciences operation,” says Åsa Arvidsson, vice president EMEA north region at Rockwell Automation. “As personalized treatments, single-use skids, and rapid-development programs become more common, manufacturers need the agility to develop, test, improve and manufacture at a pace far quicker than ever before. This can only be achieved efficiently with digitalized process and automation solutions, developed specifically with pharma needs in mind.”

The purpose of the Testa Center, according to Hedberg, is to make it possible for small research groups and small companies to verify their innovations. “We're a non-profit organization that provides a production-like environment for test runs of products and procedures,” he says.

“The future of medicine is combining new technologies and innovations into more precision treatment,” adds Lotta Ljungqvist, former CEO of the Testa Center. “That's something we call precision medicine or personalized medicine—you can get treated without side effects and also more efficiently and quicker.”

Platform components

At the Testa Center, all process equipment is managed by Cytiva’s Figurate automation platform, which, along with Rockwell Automation’s PlantPAx DCS (distributed control system), includes control, data acquisition and storage, centralized user management, human-machine interface (HMI), recipe creation and execution, cybersecurity, alarms and events, and report generation. The Rockwell-controlled portions of the platform are integrated under the FactoryTalk View software HMI. Cytiva’s Unicorn software provides unit-level control for its Äkta chromatography and Wave 25 bioreactor systems. According to Cytiva, its Unicorn software is designed for use on a network so that methods and data can be shared between all users and systems.

“The automation infrastructure includes the hardware and software required to run the biomanufacturing production line, designed to meet the high availability demands and data integrity requirements of all phases and commercial operations of biologics manufacturing,” explains Peter Cullen, global enterprise account manager, Rockwell Automation. “The standard configuration offers a cost-effective solution that can quickly and easily scale up, scale out and transition to new products. From single unit operations to full scale production across the entire process, this configuration provides flexible production options and faster turnaround of batches.”

Cullen noted that Cytiva and Rockwell are collaborating to create PlantPAx software libraries for Cytiva’s upstream and downstream bioprocessing equipment based on Rockwell standards.

Industry applications

Another facet of this collaboration between Rockwell Automation and Cytiva is the creation of an Automation and Digital Transformation Center in Shanghai, China. This center focuses on exploring application of the Industrial Internet of Things and augmented reality across pharmaceutical manufacturing processes.

David Rubin, commercial and business director at Cytiva, adds that Cytiva, in conjunction with Rockwell, has supplied multiple unit operations to a Chinese biomanufacturer to integrate with its PlantPAx DCS. “We’ve also supplied multiple PlantPAx controlled unit operations to a U.S. West Coast biotech company focused on cell and gene therapies. Both these companies selected the solution as it offers rapid, pre-tested, pre-verified functionality which has the robust, scalable functionality enabling the users to reduce paper, facilitate investigations and enable faster changeovers while maintaining safety and regulatory compliance.”