PHARMA FOCUS: TABLETTING & ENCAPSULATION
Fette Compacting supports By-Health to achieve
efficient production By-Health, a manufacturer of dietary supplements based in China, has completely revolutionised the way it produces Keylid glucosamine tablets with the installation of several tablet compacting machines from Fette Compacting. The technology fully supports By-Health’s initial move to transparent manufacturing and its subsequent transformation to intelligent production.
F
OUNDED IN OCTOBER 1995, By-Health is a publicly listed company in China that specialises in the research and production
of health supplements. After 20 years of development, it has become one of the most benchmarked enterprises in the Chinese dietary supplement industry. In 2012, By-Health commissioned the third phase of its factory, which boasts a total annual production capacity of up to 5bn tablets, 3mn soft capsules, 500mn hard capsules, 250mn bags and 15mn cans of powder vitamin and dietary supplements respectively. The factory is certainly one of Asia’s leading dietary supplement manufacturing bases in terms of hardware. By-Health also developed the site as the first intelligent ‘transparent factory’ within China’s dietary supplement industry. A transparent factory is one where production is open or visible to the public through the use of transparent
In the past, By-Health operated different
Fette Compacting’s P3030 Facelift tablet press in operation at By-Health’s compacting department
workshop walls, which means people can see
tablet presses from domestic Chinese and foreign
By-Health’s production process and advanced
brands, yet with its production expansion, many
production equipment. This concept officially
problems occurred. These included:
compression room, affecting the placement
became an AAAA-grade industries tourist
• Reduced efficiency affected by machine quality
of other process equipment. In addition,
attraction in China in 2018. Additionally, an online
– The failure rate of the original imported tablet
the aesthetics of the machine, particularly
and real time site visit is possible via the internet
press was high. An engineer from the supplier
the outer surface, was very rough and not
and enabled by webcams.
was frequently required to conduct on-site
suitable for public display, according to the
maintenance, and eventually the machine was
manufacturer’s perspective. • High powder leakage and very low yield – The
DEMANDING PRODUCTION REQUIRES A ROBUST SOLUTION
sent back to the supplier’s factory for repairs. By-Health criticised the slow response of
raw material powder of Keylid is yellow in
In 2012, the Keylid glucosamine chondroitin
the foreign machine supplier and its lack of
colour. When operating with the domestic
sulphate calcium supplement was introduced
sufficient stock of spare parts, which caused
tablet press, the filling parts, turret surface
to market. This dietary supplement is intended
a delay in its planned manufacturing schedule.
and discharge chute all became covered with
to support the bone joint health of middle-aged
It took several months for the supplier to send
a large amount of the yellow powder. The
people and geriatrics. At present, the annual
the tablet press back to the producer’s factory
sales of Keylid are more than 1bn Chinese Yuan
for repairing. By-Health, which has a great
Renminbi ($15bn). Its year-on-year growth was
demand for higher output, simply
to produce bad tablets became high on the
nearly 200% in 2018.
couldn’t accept this.
domestic press. This equipment had problems
Keylid contains calcium carbonate, which
• Domestic tablet press becomes rudimentary
product yield was also very low. • Unstable tablet quality – The probability
with the spindle eccentricity tolerances and
requires high compression forces during the
– The output of the press from the Chinese
great pressure measurement deviation.
tablet compression process. Consequently, high
supplier was 200 000 to 300 000 tablets per
Ultimately, the rate of bad tablets became
performing tablet compacting machines are the
hour. Its footprint was 1 700mm × 2 000mm
most important production equipment in the
× 2 100mm with a weight of 8 000kg, which
These problems forced By-Health to look for a
manufacturing process chain of this product.
occupied too much space in By-Health’s
suitable alternative tablet press that could fulfil
22
QUARTER 1 2021 // P&C AFRICA
unacceptably high.
