Industry 4.0 appears to hold much potential to transform biopharma manufacturing with cognitive computing, intelligent systems and new technologies and automation. But the big question for biopharma is how does it implement these systems in an efficient way?
Readers are invited to join The Medicine Maker, Ireland’s National Institute of Bioprocessing Research and Training (NIBRT), and industry experts for an insightful discussion about Industry 4.0 on 13 & 14 November 2018 in Cork, Ireland, at Biopharma Trends: Towards Industry 4.0.
“I am deeply passionate about the topic of Industry 4.0,” says Frank Cordes, Partner & Managing Director, London, at the Boston Consulting Group, and one of the speakers for the event. “I am looking forward to talking about the work I do and also hearing from attendees about what they are doing. Conferences like this are a fantastic platform for discussion and for exchange.”
The Medicine Maker has always prided itself on delivering intelligent and enjoyable content about the pharma industry and you can expect the same high standards at Biopharma Trends 2018: Towards Industry 4.0. This event will not be about selling the concept of Industry 4.0, but igniting valuable discussion about the pros and cons of Industry 4.0, user experiences (good and bad), different technologies, and how feasible Industry 4.0 is for the biopharma industry. NIBRT will also be running workshops alongside the event covering various topics related to the manufacture of biopharmaceuticals.
“From my perspective, the industry is on the threshold of transformation, but in pharma it can take a long time to cross that threshold! So the key questions are, how are we going to make that move faster, and in the most efficient way, and ensure that we end up in the right place? To do that, I think it’s important to understand where we are right now, what the missed opportunities are in the past, and where we want to get to with Industry 4.0. We have waited long enough for this transformation to happen,” says Bernhardt Trout, Director, Novartis-MIT Center for Continuous Manufacturing, at MIT.
Trout will be speaking on the second day of the conference about the journey to Industry 4.0, including the complications about what data to collect and what to do with it in the context of complex systems that the industry is working with on a molecular level. “Part of the hesitation to adopt Industry 4.0 for many companies is that not only do they not have a full understanding of different computer systems and data, but they are also lack an adequate understanding of cells and biological systems - which are a key point for the pharma industry when making new products,” says Trout.
“On day one, I’ll be talking about the factory of the future as I imagine it in the pharmaceutical industry, as well as the importance of data infrastructure and connectivity behind the different work centers in the plant,” says Cordes. “I’ll also follow up with some concrete examples of what we are already doing with pharmaceutical companies to create the lab of the future, or the quality assurance group of the future, or the filling operation of the future.”
Attendees will also have the opportunity to learn about other technological innovations – Jonas Bostrom from AstraZeneca will be talking about the power of virtual reality, Caitlin O’Mahony-Hartnett from Janssen Sciences will discuss data analytics, and Lucy Foley from the UK’s Centre for Process Innovation will look at how biopharma compares with other high-tech manufacturing sectors.
You can register for the event at www.bioipharmatrends.com. Or email alice.danielswright@texerepublishing.com if you’d like more details.
- Jim Breen, Vice President, lead Biologic Expansion, J&J
- Gerald Kierans, Director of Technical Services, Pfizer
- Lucy Foley, Director of Biologics, UK Centre for Process Innovation
- Harold Baseman, CEO, ValSource
- Colin Clarke, Principal Investigator, NIBRT
- Eduard Viladesau, Principal, Boston Consulting Group
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