+3K
Employees
Pharma Debottlenecking Project Delivers €2.6M Benefit
Faced with rising demand for a critical active pharmaceutical ingredient (API), a mid-sized pharmaceutical company needed to rapidly increase production capacity at its Italian facility. EFESO led a debottlenecking initiative, unlocking €2.6M in real benefit and positioning the plant to support future growth.
Industry: Life Sciences
Service: Manufacturing
Service: Operational Excellence
Service: Operations Strategy and Transformation
Our Client
A mid-sized pharmaceutical company specializing in the production of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs). The organization operates production with one of its most strategic APIs manufactured in Italy.
+€700M
Annual turnover
15
Countries with production plants
The Challenge
Growing market demand for one of the company’s strategic APIs required a significant capacity increase at its Italian facility. However, the plant faced multiple obstacles:
- Operational bottlenecks limiting production volume
- Technological and process constraints impacting throughput scalability
- Quality and regulatory requirements under GMP conditions
- Waste disposal and logistics constraints restricting higher output
The company needed to determine the most efficient technological and organizational solution to increase producible volumes while maintaining compliance and optimizing capital and operational expenditures.
Real Results Achieved Together
A structured debottlenecking initiative enabled the business to identify and prioritize the optimal scenario for implementation, achieving measurable financial and operational improvements beyond expectations.
+€2.6m
Real benefit delivered (vs. €2.49M expected)
-5% to -30%
COGS reduction
+10% to +20%
Yield improvement
Transformation Impact
- First debottlenecking scenario implemented and adopted by management
- Direct labor costs reduced by 10% to 40%
- ROI increased by 40% to 60%
- OEE improved by 5% to 30%
- Business cases and implementation plans designed for each scenario, enabling clear investment decision-making
Our Approach
EFESO led a multifunctional client team to identify and quantify all production constraints across technology, quality and GMP compliance, waste management and logistics. Each constraint was mapped, analyzed and translated into actionable improvement opportunities.
The approach included:
- Conducting a detailed bottleneck assessment to determine limiting factors in current processes
- Designing multiple scenarios to increase producible volume with corresponding CAPEX and OPEX profiles
- Building business cases and implementation plans for each scenario
- Enabling leadership to quickly prioritize and implement the most beneficial option
This methodology ensured both strategic rigor and speed, enabling the organization to act decisively and achieve gains exceeding expectations.
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