There is no doubt that the current and future outlook for nutraceutical companies manufacturing capsules and tablets will continue to flourish, so how can we present and offer solutions for this burgeoning market? The answer lies in understanding the challenges manufacturers face and the opportunities presented by wet granulation and how effectively this process can be implemented into manufacturing.

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Globally, the stranglehold many large granulated excipient producers have on the nutraceutical industry is overwhelmingly effecting their output of product, so by bringing these wet granulation processes in-house, production and costs become much more efficiently controlled.

Wet granulation is a process used to bind different powders with the addition of a liquid solution or adhesive to produce granules or agglomerates. Why do we granulate? We do so to offer: improved powder flow characteristics, improved compressibility, reduced segregation and fines, and controlled blend uniformity of granulated powder for use in tablet or capsule dosage forms. Ultimately, we create a more robust product that can be tableted or encapsulated easily and we remove problems associated with raw material variability by processing it to our desired standards in-house. By having a stable, granulated product, the potential for higher output on tableting and encapsulation equipment can be drastically improved. With a brief understanding of the benefits of wet granulation, how will this benefit nutraceutical companies looking to manufacture their own granulated product?

When nutraceutical companies can offer a supplement where they have granulated and packaged the final product in-house, they have two distinct competitive advantages in their respective markets. The first advantage is raw product cost. Paying for product that has already been granulated can be extremely expensive. Having your own granulation equipment will pay for itself quickly due to the cost benefits of purchasing powders, not granulated product. The second distinct advantage is product quality. Granulating products in-house offers a higher level of product control, and increases the quality of your final product. Now that we have established the advantages of wet granulation, let&#;s take a look at the equipment Syntegon offers to reduce costs and stabilize product quality.

For the nutraceutical industry, Syntegon offers a compact solution for high-quality granulation processes, called our GranuLean line. GranuLean is a standardized granulation line for high-shear granulation, fluid bed granulation, as well as pellet coating. Within this system, our fluid bed utilizes our diskjet and three-component nozzle technology, which produces and guarantees excellent quality of the granules with much shorter process times. Our high-shear mixer offers patented technology with our Gentlewing blade impeller.  The Gentlewing blade allows for minimal product adhesion to the walls of the bowl, along with the Gentlewing producing a much more homogeneous distribution of the active ingredient. This uniform distribution of is key for ensuring content uniformity of low content active ingredients batch after batch. Another very unique attribute to our Gentlewing technology is the dramatic increase in yields achieved through the scraping of the bowl. The tight tolerance of the blade to the bowl, removes the need for manual intervention to discharge the bowl.

Both the fluid bed and high-shear mixer offer unsurpassed technology with higher output and reduced production costs, ranging from 300-liter batch sizes in a compact footprint. Visit our product page to view our full portfolio.

Kevin Dudziak is Syntegon&#;s North American Business Development Manager for our Hüttlin product line.