Pharma 4.0

While Industry 4.0 is often defined as a suite of technologies converging on the modern shop floor, there are a few concepts that tie them all together.

The first is the Industrial Internet of Things. More than a technology, IIoT refers to the networking of disparate items, sensors, and people across a manufacturing facility. This connectivity creates a more holistic picture of manufacturing processes, and helps to eliminate silos.

The other is cyber-physical systems (CPS). CPS are networks that combine human and machine inputs to create better communication and support between the different actors in a factory. In simpler terms, CPS are connected systems that help support humans on the shop floor by contextualizing their activity across the digital and physical domains of manufacturing.

What they are is less important than what they do. 

CPS help people make better decisions, find new opportunities for improvement, optimize the allocation of resources, and improve quality by creating more responsive working systems. With, CPS, humans work hand-in-hand with digital manufacturing systems.

Emergent Control

Together, IIoT and CPS enable a bottom-up approach to pharmaceutical manufacturing. Hierarchical control models require more information before implementing changes. With IIoT and CPS, control is emergent. 

By emergent, we mean new patterns emerge as digital systems operation. Specifically, the increased quantity and quality of information enables manufacturers to identify local problems in real-time, and to adapt their improvements accordingly. 

Accepting emergence means accepting that we can’t have all of the answers prior to letting the system run and sampling its output. Working with emergence is key to creating value through evolution, not revolution.

Data Integrity by Design

Data integrity is one of the areas where Pharma 4.0 can contribute the most. Indeed, the ISPE outlines “Data Integrity by Design” as a desired outcome of digital maturity. 

Nevertheless, documentation in the pharmaceutical industry is often paper-based and error prone. Lack of standardization leads to data loss between research, validation, and production stages, and masks areas for process improvement. During manufacturing, engineers record machine states, batch information, and production schedules in paper forms. These logs are prone to transcription error, are labor intensive to keep, and difficult to reference. Often, mistakes are caught too late, at the end of a process. 

With Pharma 4.0 solutions they are caught in real time. This makes it possible to manufacture with a Right the First Time approach and saves time in exception handling.

The trick to implementing these concepts in practice is learning how to see pharmaceutical manufacturing problems from a different perspective.

Traditionally, changes have been large, and solutions comprehensive. This required marshalling a significant amount of organizational resources and energy around large, multi-year projects. 

With Pharma 4.0, improvement projects need not be massive, costly endeavors. 

It’s better to think in terms of localizable solutions that can be implemented quickly and scaled as necessary. 

Many manufacturers, for example, might want to improve quality, decrease process variability, improve data integrity, and simplify complex processes like line clearance and machine changeovers. Trying to solve each of these problems with a single, top-down solution can lead to reduced efficacy in each area. 

Modern Pharma 4.0 solutions work within broader quality management and manufacturing execution systems to give manufacturers a faster, more flexible means of approaching improvements. They can be configured and deployed quickly, and iterated as processes and target improvements change. What’s more, they automatically collect data while they run, helping to provide the holistic physical/digital picture of production necessary for the largest steps forward. 

Let’s look at some ways that manufacturers are already creating value with Pharma 4.0 solutions.

Electronic Log Book

Electronic logbooks automatically document relevant production information, streamlining a manual process while dramatically improving data integrity. These logbooks can compile and integrate information from machines and operators, expanding process visibility. Further, electronic logs can integrate photos, notes, reason codes, device history records, and locations providing a more holistic record of production than paper-based forms. 

Electronic logbooks ensure that information is attributable, legible, contemporaneous, original, and accurate (ALCOA).

Because these logs are digital, they can be easily accessed to prove compliance.

Line Clearance

Many line clearance processes are complex, time-intensive changeovers. With paper-based processes, workers may spend a significant amount of time looking for the next step or validating the execution of the previous one and less time progressing through the procedure.

Interactive, digital line clearance applications can make line clearance easier to navigate. Digital, IoT enabled work instructions guide users through SOPs, increasing efficiency ensuring that work is performed correctly and validated automatically. The applications record how long each step of the process takes, improving process visibility, and enabling engineers to locate areas for process improvement. Because these apps are collecting and communicating data in real time, engineers can view process status as work unfolds, leading to reduced downtime and more effective scheduling.

Electronic Batch Record

Batch record reviews require aggregating and reviewing a substantial quantity of manufacturing data and process documentation. 

Much of the labor spent in the review process comes from identifying incorrect or illegible entries, and correcting records so that all production information is available for a given batch. 

With Pharma 4.0 tools, manufacturers can make data collection and validation a continuous, seamless part of the manufacturing process. Information about manufacturing processes is automatically collected as operators and machines work, and all data is thereby attributable, legible, contemporaneous, original and accurate. 

When it’s time for a batch record review, the necessary information is accessible and easy to read. Manufacturers can spend more time ensuring the quality of a product and less time correcting transcription errors. With more data available, it’s easier to flag items to review by exception.

Process Visibility

In pharmaceutical manufacturing, the greatest barrier to process improvement isn’t always regulatory constraints. In many cases, it can be lack of process visibility. 

With IoT devices and human-centric manufacturing applications, manufacturers can break complex processes into their constituent steps, creating a granular, picture of how workers perform on the line. The applications let engineers track individual operators performance at each step. This let’s them create identify situations in which more training may be necessary. It also helps engineers differentiate between poor operator performance and poor process design. 

In our experience, many of these changes are incremental, and can yield significant gains in quality and efficiency without triggering an audit or requiring revalidation.

Clean Room Monitoring

IIoT makes it possible to respond to changes in environmental conditions as they develop. Connected sensors can detect when conditions may exceed established thresholds, and alert operators to take the proper action before interrupting production. 

Training for Regulated Environments

Many manufacturing processes require a significant investment in training. Training can be slow, as manufacturers have a difficult time replicating “real-life” production scenarios in their training programs. This leads additional costs sunk in training, and quality can suffer if operators aren’t trained effectively. 

Using manufacturing apps, manufacturers can design Pharma-specific training applications to get employees on the line fast. Engineers can break multi-stage processes into their constituent parts with targeted modules, and embedded media like videos and images help convey information to different styles of learner. If it’s not possible to take workers off the line during reskilling periods, training applications can be configured to facilitate on the job training (OJT). 

Further, manufacturers can simulate processes in production settings by running apps in an “offline” mode. Here, training modules walk employees through a process and collect data on their performance, while governed execution mode makes sure that learners don’t impact production. 

Big Data Analytics

Manufacturers generate a truly massive quantity of data in the course of operations. Yet most of this data isn’t used as the basis for production insights. This is because it can be too unwieldy or unstructured to be valuable (also referred to as Data Rich, Information Poor, or “DRIP”). 

One of the promises of Pharma 4.0 is the enhanced interpretation of the data collected throughout a product’s lifecycle. With advances in AI and machine learning, systems are better able to parse and find connections within large data sets.

It helps to see how these individual use cases come together to create value on the shop floor. Let’s look at a case study to see how one manufacturer used Pharma 4.0 tools and concepts to foster continuous improvement in a highly regulated environment.

Case 1: Improving Process Visibility in an FDA Compliant Facility

The Challenge

This manufacturer faced a challenge shared by many pharmaceutical manufacturers. Because their production took place in segregated clean rooms, they were unable to communicate effectively during production. Projects were allocated to rooms, and the engineers used static, visual markers, like colored magnets, to display room status. 

This manufacturer had a difficult time tracking the progress of jobs through rooms while still complying with FDA guidelines for process documentation.

The Solution

This manufacturer used a number of Pharma 4.0 tools to address this issue. 

Tulip offered a lightweight means of improving visibility within a validated facility. Working with Tulip partners who specialized in deploying technology in regulated environments, this manufacturer digitized processes using a no code manufacturing application platform. Instead of using magnets to track room status, the manufacturer used no code databases and visual dashboards to monitor and display the status of each room in real time. IPads were placed outside of each room, letting workers log room status, and creating a digital record of production immediately available for analysis.

When room status changed, the manufacturing application system immediately alerted the next team, reducing wasted time between processes.

While this manufacturer scanned all necessary documents for compliance purposes, the information wasn’t available to inform process improvements. With the new system, the information immediately helped to identify bottlenecks. Given that this facility lacked the space for additional equipment, optimizing production processes was essential for maximizing value. 

In the end, this company was able to balance GMP compliance and continuous improvement.

Case 2: Digital SOPs Cleaning Complex Continuous Manufacturing Equipment

The Challenge

Another manufacturer used Pharma 4.0 techniques to improve complex equipment setup. This included the disassembly, cleaning, and assembly of individual parts of its manufacturing line. This complex piece of continuous manufacturing equipment consisted of 16000 individual parts, and each stage of the manufacturing line took two weeks to clear. Instructions for line clearance consisted of 30 SOPs packaged in an 80-page document, leading to slow execution times and difficult validation procedures.

The Solution

This company used digital application to guide operators through the setup of the line. The application let workers route directly to subtasks, eliminating the need to locate and reference steps within the proper SOP. This made it easier for new employees to learn the necessary steps needed to disassemble, clean, and assemble individual parts of the organization’s manufacturing line.

These digital work instructions eliminated paper from the line, and helped to record execution and validation data in the course of the cleaning process.

These tools reduced the process from 10 to 2 day, and simplified reporting. 

The pharmaceutical manufacturing industry is evolving at a rapid speed. 

While the FDA and manufacturers both envision a world in which compliance is a lower touch, collaborative exercise, balancing continuous improvement with compliance will remain essential for years to come. 

The promise of Pharma 4.0 lies in its ability to unlock new potential for productivity and quality while making compliance a seamless part of the manufacturing process. 

Manufacturers who take the necessary steps to embrace a digital future now stand to benefit from seamless compliance, but it need not stop there. By adopting a Pharma 4.0 strategy, manufacturers can increase connectivity, efficiency, and agility.