Contact: Frank Rath
608-263-5989
MADISON, Wis.—The University of Wisconsin College of Engineering and Small Business Development Center (SBDC) have launched a biotech process-improvement program, working with NeoClone in Madison, Catalent in Middleton and Invitrogen in Milwaukee. While biotech companies are highly successful at science side of their business, many lack the experience and skill set required to design an effective process that will take their discoveries from the lab to the marketplace. This new program is intended to help biotech companies reduce lead time, variability and costs, while improving process quality and the likelihood of success on the market.
Launched in October and slated to be complete in June 2009, the program uses engineering tools, strategies and methods that have proven successful at increasing process efficiency and effectiveness at companies such as John Deere and Harley-Davidson.
“Although there has been a significant amount of money and effort committed to the development and growth of the biotech and medical device industries in the last decade, no one has proposed that the techniques that have successfully transformed other companies be deployed in the biotech arena,” said Frank Rath, program director at UW-Madison.
The program employs a unique project-based model in which faculty from the College of Engineering and SBDC work with the company through discovery, analysis and implementation. The faculty will:
* Interview employees to better understand the company’s business model and order fulfillment process
* Define the overall process and program goals
* Collect data on the process
* Analyze data and identify opportunities for process and lead-time reduction improvement
* Develop recommendations to improve the process and reduce variability and lead times
* Implement recommendations by training employees on the operations floor and in the classroom
* Monitor the company’s progress towards meeting its process improvement and lead-time reduction goals
The College of Engineering and SBDC are seeking two additional companies to participate in the pilot program. For more information, contact Frank Rath at rath@engr.wisc.edu or 608-334-1303. This pilot program is funded in part by a 2008-09 UW-Extension Program Innovation Fund grant and by a Continuing EDvantage Grant from the Division of Continuing Education, Outreach and E-Learning, University of Wisconsin-Extension.
