Saneca gets Gov grant to invest in API plant
The funding – from the Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport – was awarded to Saneca and partner Tau-Chem Ltd, which have established a dedicated 25-strong R&D team at the former’s facility in Hlohovec, Slovakia.
Research efforts will be concentrated in a number of areas, with the development of sustainable production methods for chiral active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) and use of renewable raw materials being the core focus.
Saneca told us: "We have been trying to incorporate an energy efficiency policy and production and usage of renewable raw material into our production processes, however, there is no specific goal within this project to enhance this process."
In addition, Saneca said its opiate development team will use some of the money to fund assessment of anti-abuse technologies for finished dosage form products.
Saneca has made a number of investments at the Hlohovec facility in recent months. In September, it said it would spend €3.5m to increase small-scale API production capacity.
The firm has also signed a number of supply contracts, most notably with Xantis Pharma for which it will make 20 generic drugs.
In 2015, it was hired to supply opiate chemical intermediates to US-based manufacturer AMRI.
Both contracts will be based at the Hlohovec facility.
