Global competition is pushing the industry towards faster time-to-market and more efficient and flexible processes. Modular plants are considered as potential bridges between the flexibility of batch plants and the efficiency of continuous processes, which could improve the competitiveness of the chemical industry. Microinnova Engineering is a pioneer in continuous processing, establishing innovative technology for chemical syntheses in pharmaceutical and chemical production. The Austrian company, founded in 2003, initially was specialized in the field of micro reactor technology and micro chemical engineering, but – following global market demands – extended its core business to all available and suitable technologies for continuous chemical processing and process intensification (PI). CHEManager asked Dirk Kirschneck, founder and CEO of Mircoinnova Engineering, about the potential that modular plants have to improve the efficiency and flexibility of fine chemical production and the challenges for an overall implementation and standardization across the industry.

CHEManager: Mr. Kirschneck, which services does Microinnova offer and in which areas do you focus your activities?

Dirk Kirschneck: We are specialized in continuous manufacturing and process intensification in the chemical industry, where we offer process development, plant engineering services and turnkey plants. In other words, we transform batch processes into more efficient continuous processes which provide economic benefits to the industry. Our approach is very systematic and consists of four phases: process design, chemical and technical feasibility, optimization and piloting and finally building the plant. Most of our customers are in the fine chemical and pharmaceutical branch, where batch has been predominantly used.

In which geographical markets is your company active?

D. Kirschneck: Our main market is Europe where most of our projects have taken place but that does not mean that we only cover Europe. We have had pleased customers with our services from across the world, like Asia and Middle East. We see that countries with medium economic strength build their own process industries, which means that processing becomes more regional in the future and has a need of modular flexible manufacturing units.

What would you define as the main drivers for Industry 4.0 in the chemical sector?

D. Kirschneck: The most important driver is speed, especially time-to-market. That means that the company with the quickest supply of a specific molecule on a reasonable cost level gains a strategic market advantage. The second most important driver is manufacturing costs especially in competition with the Far East. A high level of process understanding and precise control by efficient, flexible, well automated plants using a low level of work force will be an important key for competitiveness. The third driver is quality. Process capability strategies common in other industries will be more important in the future. That means it will be of prime importance that all molecules will have exactly the same conditions. Whereas at the moment processing regimes like hot spots, temperature or concentration gradients or shear differences especially occurring in batch processes are determinant for the level of quality.

How will modular and flexible continuous operating manufacturing plants impact the future competitiveness of processing companies?

D. Kirschneck: Continuous plants deliver benefits according to the previously explained drivers. We expect that in 10 year’s time more than 50% of processing will be executed continuously, since there are important business drivers pushing towards continuous manufacturing.

What do you consider to be the biggest challenges for an overall implementation of continuous manufacturing across the chemical and pharmaceutical industry?

D. Kirschneck: We see the biggest hurdles are the skill set of the people on all levels as well as in the conservative strategy approaches of the different processing industries. A transformation of decision making and operations of chemical plants will extremely accelerate implementation of continuous processes and increase economic benefits. A strategically important step is to innovate in advanced technology, because it will be the only way for an increase in competitiveness. Even if old paid plants deliver higher margins on short term, there is no alternative for innovation towards competitiveness.

Microinnova collaborated with GSK to produce a pilot scale demonstration rig for the manufacture of toothpaste via a continuous process intensification method. What was the result of the project?

D. Kirschneck: This project demonstrates how complex formulations can benefit from continuous manufacturing. Formulations can become more complex, since the options for manufacturing increase. It has been shown, that a higher quality level has been archived with tighter specification limits. The formulation can be produced about ten times faster, since the necessary residence times are about a magnitude smaller. This enables much smaller manufacturing plants on a higher quality level.

Do you also cooperate with academic institutions to designs efficient processes?

D. Kirschneck: Yes, there are several projects where Microinnova is an active member. We bring the expertise of continuous manufacturing, scale-up and plant design. This enables us to be at the edge of development and to integrate latest scientific results into its products.

Here are some projects where we have been actively participating: PICASCO, COSMIC, ONE-Flow, CC-Flow, BIOGO.

In October last year Microinnova announced that Evonik Nutrition & Care ordered a flexible continuous plant for the production of active pharmaceutical ingredients and advanced intermediates. Can you give us an update on the status of this project?

D. Kirschneck: The modular multipurpose plant consisting of a plug and play concept has already been built, sent and tested at the customer’s site. We received excellent feedback and were able to deliver what our client expected. We are happy to have contributed to this expansion project of Evonik’s capabilities. I would like to add that we are seeing a great increase of interest and upward trend towards modular plants and flexible continuous manufacturing.