During our evaluation of thepotential of surfactant technology, we have identified a variety of straight forward and highly advantageous transformations and applied them successfully on-scale on various chemo and biocatalytic transformations. Implementation of the technology typically results into significant benefits across our entire portfolio, not just from an environmental standpoint but also from an economic and productivity perspective. To name a few: reduction of organic solvent consumption, water use and cycle time, milder reaction conditions, improved yields and selectivities, which all contribute to improved process performance and lower manufacturing costs.These surfactant mediated reactions can be up-scaled in the already existing multi-purpose facilities of pharmaceuticalor chemical organizations, using a catalytic amount of a combination of a non-ionic designer surfactant (e.g. TPGS-750-M, PS-750-M) in water, and a well-chosen organic co-solvent instead of traditional and undesirable organic solvents. The opportunity tomerge various types of catalysis via compartmentalization effect is particularly exciting and will be discussed today.
Fabrice Gallou, Distinguished Scientist at Novartis, received his Ph.D. at The Ohio State University in 2001, after which he moved to Boehringer-Ingelheim USA, working as a process chemist responsible for route scouting and supply of early phase programs. He subsequently moved in 2006 to the Chemical Development group at Novartis, Switzerland,as a process development chemist, and became in 2008 responsible for global scientific activities, overseeing development and implementation of practical and economical chemical processes for large scale production of APIs. His research interests rely in the research and development of sustainable synthetic methodologies intended for large scale implementation. For the past decade, he has been spearheading the development of chemistry in water using surfactants, focusing on its use and impact on chemo and biocatalysis. He published more than 200 peer-reviewed papers, book chapters, and patents, and won multiple awards, more recently the 2019 Swiss Chemical Society Senior Industrial Award, and the 2019 Yves Chauvin Award from the French Chemical Society.
