Süd-Chemie Launches Package Production at Northeast Plant

Süd-Chemie Performance Packaging will collaborate with Medical Instill Technologies Inc. (MedInstill) on production of custom injection-molded medical devices and packaging at a facility unveiled at MedInstill’s plant in New Milford, CT, on October 10.

Süd-Chemie will work with Med-Instill to commercialize its aseptic packaging and delivery devices, as well as produce the Süd-Chemie line of polymer packaging products, such as printed tubes and desiccant stoppers, the companies announced.

Süd-Chemie officers joined Daniel Py, MedInstill’s founder and president, and local and state officials in unveiling its production facility where Süd-Chemie has started producing caps and injection-molded tubes.

Stefan Laetsch, Süd-Chemie’s group vice president, performance packaging, said the company’s em­ployment at the site will increase from 50 to more than 200, with a planned plant expansion in 2009. Ad­ditional units for injection- and blow-molding production will be added.

A Süd-Chemie Performance Packaging desiccant stopper is made on one of the company’s new lines in New Milford, CT.

“A new era for Süd-Chemie Packaging is starting at New Milford. It will bring a lot of new technology and advanced polymer packaging solutions into mass pro­­­d­uction for worldwide markets,” Laetsch said.

“The Connecticut site allows us to work with MedInstill on its ground-breaking technologies, as well as bring our full range of capabilities and technical services even closer to our important U.S. customers,” he said.

Laetsch added that “the future is in custom packaging solutions,” noting that Süd-Chemie’s plastic-additives manufacturing capacity will address development of innovative materials.

Süd-Chemie will manufacture parts for MedInstill’s delivery devices, which MedInstill will fill using its Intact Sterile Filling System, one of the company’s two core technologies.

The Intact system fills containers that are supplied closed, sterile, and ready to fill, employing a noncoring needle and elastomeric resealable stopper. Glaxo­Smith­Kline Biologicals has im­ple­mented the tech­­­nology to produce vials and prefilled syringes for vaccines and inject­ibles since acquiring exclusive rights in 2003. GSK’s Aseptic Technologies subsidiary sells the system. Nestle´ SA has licensed the technology for use in liquid nutrition.

Used for treatment in fields such as ophthalmology and dermatology, Med­Instill devices em­ploy the Pure-Dose one-way viscoelastic valve. The system keeps unpreserved multidose formulations contamination free. De­vices using the Pure Dose technology in­clude pen-style systems such as Pen-­­Instill and Mini-Instill. In its ad­vanced prototype stage, Eye-Instill is a plastic housing that supports eye medication delivery, with a pump system for propelling a metered dose after automatically lowering the eyelid.

Süd-Chemie tube and stopper solutions made at New Milford will target an “exploding effervescent tablet market,” the company stated. The plant joins the firm’s U.S. manufacturing and distribution facilities in Belen, NM; Louisville, KY; and Colton, CA.