Launch of Cross-Europe nano-pharmaceutical project “PHOENIX” coordinated in Luxembourg

23 February 2021

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11 project partners from academia and industry located all across Europe have joined forces in a project called PHOENIX to create an “Open Innovation Test Bed” for nano-pharmaceuticals and it will all be coordinated in the Grand Duchy by Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology (LIST).

PHOENIX is an innovation project funded by EU’s Horizon2020 Framework Programme and it aims to provide services for the development, characterisation, testing, safety assessment, scale-up, GMP production and commercialisation of nano-pharmaceuticals to the market, making them available to SMEs, start-ups, research laboratories and interested users.

The project is coordinated by Dr Tommaso Serchi at LIST and supported at MyBiotech near Saarbrücken for the Scientific Coordination by Dr Nazende Günday-Türeli. PHOENIX will have a duration of 48 months starting on 1 March 2021 with a total budget of €14.450 million and a requested EU contribution of €11.1 million.

What are nano-pharmaceuticals?

They are drugs that use nanotechnology (the use of matter on an atomic, molecular, and supramolecular scale for industrial purposes) in some form. This could be in the sense that the drugs themselves are nanomaterials. For example, contrast agents are used in the form of nanoparticles rather than a molecule because nanoparticles are more stable and can stay longer in blood. Another example could be that the nanoparticle is used as a capsule to encapsulate the drug and protect it while enhancing adsorption and distribution.

Nano-pharmaceuticals have the potential to drive the scientific and technological uplift, offering great clinical and socioeconomic benefits to society in general, industry, key stakeholders and patients. Nevertheless, affordable and advanced testing, manufacturing facilities and services for novel nano-pharmaceuticals are main prerequisites for successful implementation of these advances to further enhance the growth and innovation capacity.

The implementation of an Open Innovation Test Bed

The establishment of current good manufacturing practice (cGMP) in nano-pharmaceutical production on a large scale is the key step to successfully transferring nano-pharmaceuticals from bench to bedside (from lab to industrial scale). Due to the lack of resources to implement GMP manufacturing at site, the upscaling and production of innovative nano-pharmaceuticals is still challenging to main players of EU nanomedicine market, start-ups and SMEs. To allow successful implementation of the nano-pharmaceuticals in the nanomedicine field, there is an urgent need to establish a science and regulatory-based Open Innovation Test Bed (OITB).

The PHOENIX project aims to enable the seamless, timely and cost-friendly transfer of nano-pharmaceuticals from lab bench to clinical trials by providing the necessary advanced, affordable and easily accessible PHOENIX -OITB which will offer a consolidated network of facilities, technologies, services and expertise for all the technology transfer aspects from characterisation, testing, verification up to scale up, GMP compliant manufacturing and regulatory guidance.

PHOENIX-OITB will develop and establish new facilities and upgrade existing ones to make them available to SMEs, starts-up and research laboratories for scale-up, GMP production and testing of nano-pharmaceuticals. The services and expertise provided by the OITB will include production and characterisation under GMP conditions, safety evaluation, regulatory compliance and commercialisation boost.

The 11 partners that form the PHOENIX consortium

More information on the project on LIST’s website

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