Attended: Interphex 2010

Bioreactors. Capsule fillers. Filtration systems. Clean room doors and clean room floors.  Containment solutions. Films.  Filling lines. Pumps.  Construction services.  Label printers.

These were among the many, many products I saw while visiting Interphex 2010. While I’m not in the market for laboratory equipment or services (yet), I like knowing what happens on the lab floor, seeing what happens when a idea goes from concept to product, and talking to the engineers that make it happen.  The Interphex conference is like crack cocaine for anyone with a fetish for biopharm manufacturing.

For me, the highlight of show was the bioreactors. I’ve written about these essential life sciences tools, but the trend is increasingly toward single-use systems that can be easily configured for small labs and scaled quickly.

The folks at the GE were showing off their Wave Bioreactor. Manufactured in Sweden, The Wave system is based on a one-use bag system on a rocking platform, that ‘provides mixing and oxygen transfer, resulting in a perfect environment for cell growth.” The GE folks were helpful and gave me this great USB bracelet that mimicked the booth perfectly and provided links to each of the products.

At the ThermoFisher booth, I had a great conversation with François Collins, their Canadian BioProcess Production rep. He told me about their HyClon bioprocessing containers. The BPC systems also consist of flexible plastic containers, ports, tubings, and fittings that can be configured according to a laboratories specific needs. One thing François pointed out to me was that using a single manufacturer for your lab equipment and the ancillary connectors and bags means you don’t have to re-validate each time you put together a new lab or create new equipment.

Millipore Distinguishes their Bioreactors with Branding

I had a great conversation with Vikas Gupta of Millipore regarding their Mobius Single Use (@MobiusSingleUse) line of bioreactors. That colorful piece of cell-growing equipment is a case study in engineering and branding. It’s the first bioreactor to break with the stainless steel and white plastic look that most laboratories sport.

Vikas told me there was some pushback when initially introduced but now clients are asking if they can get them in colors other than green, blue and pink(!). He likened the system to Legos, allowing customers to configure as needed and told me of a lab where the majority of workers were women of small stature and needed a bioreactor system they wouldn’t need to move or lift. Mobius allowed this.

I admire Millipore for having the guts to break with tradition and use color to complement its already well-known engineering expertise. Hey, if design allows Apple to charge a premium price, why shouldn’t lab suppliers do the same. This is clearly the trend of the future.

In fact, the folks at Brand Institute also had a small booth in the middle of the event. Brand Institute typically works on branding pharmaceutical products. Seeing them there confirms that life sciences suppliers must be thinking about branding and if they’re not they soon will be.

The best part of going to a trade show like this is the conversations you have with the different vendors, learning what visitors are asking about, what marketing problems they are facing, and getting exposed to new technologies.

Shoutouts to Cindy Buckelew of Talisco, David Joesten of CCL Insertco, Frank Draper of Master Control, Bruce Huval of uCompli, Shannon McCue of Brand Institute, Joe Cascone of Metrics, James Kwon of Norwich Pharma, Alan Nix of Applied Chemical Technology (thanks for explaining Fluid bed mixers!), Sean Sommer of Jacobs, Dayne Callum of Millipore, and Natasha Benalt of Michael Benalt, for making Interphex 2010 a great show.