BellaSeno Establishes High-Throughput Additive Manufacturing Facility for Resorbable Implants

BellaSeno GmbH, an ISO 13485-certified medtech company developing absorbable scaffolds using additive manufacturing technologies, has established a novel, leading-edge additive manufacturing facility for medical implants supported by the Fraunhofer Institute for Cell Therapy and Immunology IZI, Leipzig, Germany.
 
It is the one of the first GMP-compliant manufacturing facilities worldwide to include innovative features such as high-througput additive manufacturing based on the so-called no-touch approach to significantly improve the safety and sterility of medical implants. Moreover, the facility allows for a seamless transition from R&D to commercial-scale manufacturing and provides capabilities for both internal and contract manufacturing.
 
While BellaSeno contributed its additive manufacturing expertise, Fraunhofer IZI was responsible for developing GMP-compliant processes, quality assurance and quality control. The resulting infrastructure, incl. SOPs and documentation, was then certified and transferred to BellaSeno. 
 
“We are delighted to have established a truly unique additive manufacturing facility together with Fraunhofer IZI,” said Mohit Chhaya, Ph.D., CEO of BellaSeno. “This will not only ensure leading-edge manufacturing of our own products, but also enables us to provide contract manufacturing of resorbable medical implants for a wide range of applications.”
 
He added that BellaSeno is the one of the first European companies with an ISO13485 certification covering the entire additive design and manufacturing process. Moreover, the company is able to reproducibly and routinely manufacture scaffolds with feature sizes down to 150-µm – an important differentiation factor in the additive manufacturing sector. 
 
“We are very glad to have developed a strong foundation of GMP-level production processes over the last three years in close collaboration with the Fraunhofer IZI team,”  said Arpita Desai, M.E., head of Quality Management at BellaSeno. “The exchange of knowledge throughout the project will allow us to produce implants in our new ISO 14644 Class 7 cleanroom facility at a much higher quality compared to current standards – leading to safer patient outcomes.”
 
Senella is a patented porous scaffold made of absorbable Polycaprolactone (PCL) containing highly-specialized topological and design features, which act as recipients for injected fat tissue isolated with a standard liposuction procedure. The implant is designed to get absorbed over a span of two years and to provide a stable platform for the injected fat tissue to mature, adapt to its environment and stabilize. The clinical end result is a natural soft tissue without remnants of foreign material. Senella therefore has the potential to alleviate the complications found in current breast reconstruction and augmentation approaches.
 
The Fraunhofer Institute for Cell Therapy and Immunology IZI investigates and develops solutions to specific problems at the interfaces of medicine, life sciences and engineering. One of the institute‘s main tasks is to conduct contract research for companies, hospitals, diagnostic laboratories and research institutes operating in the field of biotechnology, pharma­ceuticals and medical engineering. The Fraunhofer IZI develops, optimizes and validates methods, materials and products for the business units Cell and Gene Therapy, Drugs and Diagnostics. Its areas of competence lie in cell biology, immunology, drug biochemistry, bioanalytics and bioproduction as well as process development and automation. In these areas, research specifically focusses on the indications oncology, immunological diseases as well as infectious diseases and neurodegenerative diseases.
 
The institute works in close cooperation with hospital institutions and performs quality tests besides carrying out the GMP-compliant manufacture of clinical test samples. Furthermore, it helps partners obtain manufacturing licenses and permits.