Product Hub: Chemspeed’s SWILE© Automated Workstation

Dr. Michael Schneider, Sr VP BU Life Science for Chemspeed Technologies AG, discusses Chemspeed’s SWILE© Automated Workstation (first true gravimetric one-to-one pick and dispense of compounds)…

The compound library is at the heart of every pharmaceutical company, Chemspeed Technologies believes. Built from years of synthetic work, most potential blockbusters start and are stored here, since it is the source of all screening activities. These compounds are extremely precious: often difficult to synthesise or extract, and sometimes the world’s entire resource is in that little vial. Compound management groups from pharmaceutical companies typically handle more than tens to thousands of thousands of compounds in their libraries, and have to deliver small fractions (in milligram scale) for biological tests.

“The conventional way to automate these one-to-one dispenses with an extruder has hit its limit,” Dr. Michael Schneider, Senior Vice President of Business Development for Chemspeed Technologies AG, tells European Pharmaceutical Review. “It requires higher amounts of flowable crystalline material, is prone to cross-contamination or compound loss, and simply doesn’t meet the required accuracy. More and more compounds are not available in the required amounts, are too sticky or oily, and the required manual dispensing creates a bottle-neck.”

This is where the SWILE solution comes in. The SWILE Automated Workstation was introduced into Chemspeed’s portfolio of pharmaceutical R&D workflow solutions in 2014, driven, Dr. Schneider explains, by an industry need for automated ‘smallest amount’ solid handling for, for example, compound management and catalyst screening in conjunction with the company’s proprietary portfolio of overhead gravimetric dispensing tools for solids, liquids, viscous liquids, pastes and waxes.