Lonza, one of the key suppliers to the pharmaceutical, healthcare and life science industries is expanding its China initiatives by setting up a small scale plant which will come on stream in September 2007.
 
This facility, which operates under cGMP conditions, is designed to accommodate a greater number of reactors including a dedicated and technologically advanced Quality Control lab capable to fulfill the ever increasing requirements of global regulatory authorities on the highest possible level.
 
In the completed first build-out phase, six smaller reactors including distillation and filtration units are installed, capable of handling a broad range of technologies. The configuration ensures fast change over, optimized efficiencies and extremely rapid technical transfer to commercial assets. Additional capacity can be added without impacting running operations.

The plant is designed for production of quantities from 10 kg up to several hundreds of kg, and closes the gap between Nansha's kilo lab and commercial production assets to allow complete life-cycle support for pharmaceutical products out of China. The commercial scale API facility in Nansha is currently under construction and will house up to 200m3 reactor volume.

In April of 2006, Lonza unveiled a significant investment plan to substantially develop its Nansha Guangzhou, China operations towards the construction of an integrated Exclusive Synthesis platform with R&D capabilities as well as small and large scale cGMP manufacturing.