GlaxoSmithKline Manufacturing and Packaging Plant, Zebulon, North Carolina, USA

Glaxo Wellcome,(now known as Glaxo SmithKline or GSK), a UK-based pharmaceuticals company, instigated a project in 1999 to expand the 652,000ft² manufacturing and packaging plant in Zebulon, NC. The new 220,000ft² stand-alone facility was purpose built for light manufacturing of dry powder inhalers containing medicines that treat respiratory conditions such as asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

The adjacent plant is the main centre for the production and packaging of the migraine treatment Imitrex (sumatriptan), a triptan drug, which has a sulphonamide group.

In 1984, Glaxo Inc, as it then was, opened the Zebulon plant as its only US manufacturing and packaging site.

The merger between Glaxo and Wellcome in 1995 meant that the site was used by both companies with the former Wellcome site in Greenville, NC, being sold to Catalytica Pharmaceuticals in June 1997.

The facility currently manufactures aerosols, tablets and dermatology products and packaging for all products. It supports an administrative area, quality assurance laboratories, warehouse space and a cafeteria. GlaxoSmithKline is a leader in respiratory, central nervous system, AIDS/HIV and anti-infective research.

The Zebulon plant received a vote of confidence in autumn 1999 when the company announced that it was investing $92m in a 220,000ft² explansion. The Zebulon plant, which already employed about 1,300 workers, providing jobs for 800 full-time employees and a total of 500 temporary and contract workers was then able to employ a further 200 employees.

As part of its funding the plant received a $1.39m job development investment grant and also a $500,000 grant from the One North Carolina Fund..

ZEBULON PLANT

Glaxo Wellcome awarded Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. the contract for construction of the Multi-Dose Dry Powder Inhaler (MDPI) facility in Zebulon in North Carolina in the US. Construction commenced January 1999 and this was completed by December 2000. The facility was fully functional by 2001.

Jacobs Engineering Group, which is a well-known name in the pharmaceutical contracting industry, provided complete engineering and architectural services. Construction took around 24 months and following approval of the new facility by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) the plant started operations in 2001. The FDA approves all new sites for production of medicines to be sold in the US, even those that manufacture and fill inhalers – which could be classed as medical devices.

The 220,000ft², stand-alone facility provides light manufacturing capacity for Glaxo Wellcome's MDPI products. It also includes production lines for blending, filling, assembly and packaging. The new plant incorporated advanced technologies using custom-designed equipment. The facility also has space for quality assurance, employees, maintenance, and warehousing functions.

PALLETISING UPGRADE

A pallet switching system was introduced at the plant in 2001 to stop possibly contaminated wooden pallets coming into contact with the production area. This means that product boxes are stacked on sterilised plastic pallets in an inverted position then moved to the shipping area and restacked (and inverted the correct way up) onto the wooded pallets for shipping.

Dillard Packaging Systems provided a fully automatic pallet swapping and stretch wrapping line that can handle 50 pallets an hour (saving $100,000 per year in labour costs). The system uses two Whallon robotic pallet placers to centre the loads before changeover from one pallet to the other during the process. The pallet inverter itself was supplied by Cherry's Industrial Equipment.

The stretch wrapping is carried out by a Lan-Wrapper V-Series turntable stretch wrapping system supplied by Lantech. All of the line equipment is controlled by Allen Bradley plc. The system can handle UK or US pallet formats and also a range of heights from 24 to 60in. The stretch wrap material used is Mobilrap Pro 70 linear low-density polyethylene stretch film.

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