— New collaboration will enable scalable, cost-effective manufacturing processes
Thermo Fisher Scientific, the world leader in serving science, today announced a collaboration with Scinogy, specialists in closed, automated manufacturing systems for cell therapies, to develop and commercialize fit-for-purpose instrumentation and reagent systems aimed at improving productivity and scalability of cell and gene therapy manufacturing.
The manual processes commonly used in development and clinical trials are not cost-effective, transferable, or commercially viable. Alternative methods using more integrated systems often lack flexibility and generally suffer from poor capacity utilization. To realize the promise of cell therapy, the industry requires a novel approach. Thermo Fisher’s collaboration with Scinogy will provide closed, modular, automated systems designed to enable scalable, cost-effective cell and gene therapy development and manufacturing.
“The cell therapy industry is expanding steadily, and Thermo Fisher Scientific is committed to empowering developers to accelerate the time between R&D to full-scale manufacturing and commercialization,” said Amy Butler, vice president and general manager of cell biology at Thermo Fisher Scientific. “The team at Scinogy has an impressive track record of developing manufacturing systems that deliver high-quality, affordable cell and gene therapies, ultimately helping increase access to life-saving therapies around the world.”
As an initial result of the collaboration, Thermo Fisher will unveil the new Gibco CTS Rotea Counterflow Centrifugation System at the International Society for Cellular Therapy meeting in Melbourne from May 29-June 1. The Rotea counterflow centrifuge is a highly reproducible, closed cell processing system designed for separation, washing and concentration of both autologous and small-scale allogeneic cell therapy samples. The system features:
– Patented technology that can continuously process up to 20L of starting
volume and deliver the concentrate in as little as 5mL output containing
up to 200M cells/mL.
– Intuitive, user-programmable software and an embedded camera enable
flexibility to create and optimize a broad range of protocols.
– A gentle fluidized bed to support high-throughput and low-shear
processing with up to 97 percent cell recovery (cell type and process
dependent).
“The Rotea counterflow centrifuge is the first in a family of manufacturing technologies being developed to suit the specific challenges and needs of the cell and gene therapy industry,” said Bryan Poltilove, general manager of cell and gene therapy at Thermo Fisher Scientific. “The compact size, process flexibility and single-use kit allow the system to seamlessly scale from research through commercial manufacturing.”
