As part of its efforts to increase its India footprint, Rexam Pharma is all set to open its advanced packaging plant in Bangalore to cater to the needs of the domestic customers only.

The facility to be formally inaugurated on May 14, is located at the Peenya Industrial Area. It will provide packaging solutions for ophthalmology, solid dosage forms and medical devices for the regulated markets.

The state-of-the-art 1000 sq m class 8 clean room fully compliant cGMP standard plant will allow the company to bring in internationally known technologies like the Argus Loc child-resistant closures (CRC) and Rispharm eye dropper range. For this Rexam has invested in five new presses and a high speed automated line which will give a installed capacity of 300 million per annum.

As a division of Rexam Plastic Packaging, UK, which is the second largest packaging major globally after Tetra Pak, the parent company specializes in rigid plastic packaging, drug delivery systems and medical devices for pharmaceutical, medical and biotechnology companies. It entered India three years ago to replicate its successful development model by setting up a technology centre in Bangalore to support pharmaceutical companies with solid design and development expertise as well as regulatory support in all packaging requirements.

In 2008 Rexam chose Bangalore as a technology platform for Asia. It has constituted a team of 10 experts in manufacturing and engineering, to help its customers develop complex packaging and especially multi component devices. Another core competency area is to support its customers in all regulatory matters for new drug applications with services like USP tests and drug master file (DMF).

"From Bangalore, we intend to provide packaging requirements for the regulated markets which include Rispharm range and Argus Loc," Eric Soubeiran, business managing director, Rexam Pharma Packaging India told Pharmabiz in an email interaction.

The facility has an installed machine park of 25 Injection Moulding and Injection Blow Moulding machines with a range of 60 to 275 T and 15 to 85T respectively. This will see the production capacity generation of 200 million eyedroppers annually and 300 million CRC caps a year.

"We will continue to replicate our business model and localize production where markets are large enough and leverage on the technology platform to develop. In fact the Bangalore facility has been designed to be flexible to expand quickly," he added.

The technology centre can support customers from concept to design, proto typing, and manufacturing for all Injection moulding, Injection Blow Moulding and Assembly.

The size of the market which Rexam is keen to address is valued between $70 and $100 million. It is not looking at contract packaging opportunities, stated Soubeiran.

The Indian operations will have a total strength of around 100 employees. The company has trained its temporary workforce and converted 50 per cent of the personnel into permanent employment grade. This trend will continue alongside with our growth, he said.