Implementation of analytical technologies in a pharmaceutical development organization looking into the next millennium

Managing the implementation of new technology in a pharmaceutical development environment has provided challenges and opportunities to obtain benefits from technologies, e.g. laboratory automation. Successful application of new techniques requires a dedicated resource. Within Pharmaceutical Technologies, this was initially a single person, who has since evolved into a team dedicated to the investigation and development of robotics and non-invasive analytical techniques. Pharmaceutical development is an important interface between research and commercial manufacturing. In research, the success of genomics and combinatorial chemistry will result in a significant increase in the number of development compounds, and this, combined with the desire of commercial manufacturing to move towards parametric release, puts an emphasis on the need for rapid analytical methods. Some ideas on the techniques that will be required to meet these goals will be described together with their impact on automation.