ATMPs – Hurdles and Achievements in Quality and Safety

8./9. April 2025, Wiesbaden/Germany

Objectives

This conference track is aimed at all those who develop and manufacture cells, tissues, cell- and tissue-based products and ATMPs. The conference will address manufacturing challenges, e.g. GMP regulations, but also quality control issues, appropriate ways to maintain, assure and control the expected quality. Experienced speakers from the field of ATMP will explain the current requirements and report on their experiences during inspections and the implementation in the company.

Registration

Register as a congress delegate for just 690 EUR/day!
This special offer is only valid until 31 December 2024!

Background

Modern systems of regenerative medicines, such as cells and tissues or ATMPs (gene therapeutics, somatic cell-based products and tissue-based products) represent an innovative group of drugs that is becoming increasingly important. With the entry into force several regulatory guidelines e.g. of the European Directive EC 1394/2007 for ATMPs, such products were classified as medicinal products and must therefore comply as such with the EU requirements for medicinal products. Although the biopharmaceutical industry has considerably intensified its activities in this field, many of these products are developed and manufactured at universities, hospitals and in small and medium-sized enterprises. These university or medical roots lead to special challenges for the respective institutions as well as for the regulatory authorities in fulfilling the compliance requirements for quality, safety and GMP aspects and approval. This is also forced by frequently given manufacturing conditions, e.g. the open manipulation of cells and tissues, which are necessary for obtaining such products on a medical/surgical level or by the short shelf life of the obtained final product.
Challenges for small batch manufacturing, rapid testing and analysis and storage are only some of the challenges for such short shelf life products in terms of:

  • Comparability with Compendial Methods
  • Sensitivity and Robustness
  • Suitability Testing and Validation
  • Variability

Target Audience

This conference is aimed at all persons who

  • are involved in the extraction and manufacture of Cells, Tissues and ATMPs
  • are responsible for quality assurance and control of Cells, Tissues and ATMPs
  • are responsible for microbiological or analytical testing
  • perform inspections or audits of ATMPs facilities
  • deal with the authorisation

Moderators

Dr Ulrike Herbrand, Charles River Laboratories
Dr Sabine Hauck, Chair of ECA ATMP Interest Group

Speakers

Detailed Programme

Tuesday, 8 April 2025
09.00 - 17.30 h

Navigating the EMA Process: Key Insights from Filing for a TEMP
Dr Katja Aschermann, Astator

  • Sharing Lessons and Insights
  • CMC aspects
  • Submission and Communication with the Authorities

Quality Assurance of mRNA Vaccines for Human Use: The Role of the European Pharmacopoeia
Prof Dr Gerit Borchard, University in Geneva & member of the EDQM expert group

  • Lipid based Carrier Systems, “the lesser-known sister”
  • Approach of the EDQM
  • Contents and Future Work

HIGHLIGHT

Industrial Scale in Vitro Expression of Bacteriophages and other Proteins
Patrick Grossmann, Invitris

  • Introduction to cell-free expression - synthetic biology
  • Advantages of cell-free expression  - a game-changer for difficult to express proteins
  • Case study: Tech Transfer and upscale of a cell-free expression process for bacteriophages


Viral Clearance ATMPs - What if the Product is a Virus?

Sandra Zucchet, Charles River Laboratories

  • Challenges for Viral Clearance Strategies during Downstream Manufacturing
  • What are the possible Problems and Limitations?
  • Potential Virus Safety Strategies

Wednesday,98 April 2025
09.00 - 18.00 h

Visible and Subvisible Particle Control for Cell Therapy From Development to Commercialisation
Dr Roman Mathaes, Clear Solutions Laboratories

  • Major Challenges for Cell Therapy Manufacturing Particle control
  • Limitations of analytical methods
  • Solution approaches
  • Recent FDA warning letters

Flexibility and Redundancy in Visual Inspection Production Planning with Small-Scale Systems
Alexander Schaefer, Wilco

  • Challenges of large systems
  • Use of smaller systems
  • Flexibility for changing requirements
  • Relevance for modern products

Gloveless aseptic Fillers for small Batches and Cell & Gene Therapy Sectors: a novel Approach utilizing modular Design and magnetic Levitation Conveyors
Giacomo Guidi, IMA Life

  • Increasing demand for small batch production and the need for flexible and safe systems
  • Beyond robotic technology and introduction of a solution
  • Modular and flexible system design with Focus on CGT


Process Validation Sterile Drug Products: Strategy, Execution and maintaining the validated State
Dr Anne Orillo, Novartis

  • Strategy according to Site Validation Master Plan Stein Steriles
  • Execution – set up validation runs, known challenges and audit learnings
  • Maintaining the validated state, fit for purpose
  • Filing and regulatory feedback


Challenges on the Way to becoming a Contract Manufacturer
Dr Carolin Klemm, DKMS Stem Cells
Simone Sonnenberg, DKMS Stem Cells

  • Challenges with ATMPs
  • Transformation of DKMS Stem Cell Bank into a CDMO
  • First CDMO pilot project: Hurdles and Challenges

Vector Safety Assessment in Cell and Gene Therapy by NGS/TGS Sequencing
Dr Richard Gabriel, ProtaGene

  • Biodistribution and Persistence of gene therapy vectors
  • Vector sequencing - Identity, Integrity, Impurity
  • Insertional Mutagenesis and Clonality assessment
  • Evaluating vector-induced carcinogenesis


Challenges and Special Requirements for GMP Inspections of ATMPs
Alexander Kammerlocher, Regierungspräsidium Tübingen (local competent authority)

  • Overview of legal requirements for ATMPs
  • Special requirements for GMP of ATMPs
  • Challenges during GMP inspections based on specific examples
  • Expectations of GMP inspectorates

Programme last upated: 6 December 2024

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