Optimal Automation is following up the worldwide success of its synTQ® PAT software, for optimising Life Science and other process industry manufacturing, with the launch of synTQ® Lite, which has been developed to suit the specific needs of clients, who would like to explore the opportunities for PAT on restricted budgets, or prove the concept of PAT on single product lines before full implementation.

synTQ Lite provides a cost effective entry level PAT Data Management System that is vendor neutral, and can be deployed on any single instrument system. Essentially a restricted-functionality version of the main synTQ® product line, synTQ Lite is specifically aimed at instrument OEMs and users wishing to cost evaluate PAT systems.

“PAT is a powerful platform that equips users with the potential to bring a development product to market quicker, at a lower cost of development and then manufacture it faster to a higher quality, yet at lower cost” said Optimal Sales and Marketing Director, Martin Gadsby. “However, with tight budgets all around at present, the initial justification for a full PAT is sometimes difficult to justify. The launch of synTQ Lite overcomes this problem, by allowing the benefits of PAT to be proven at low cost, with the added advantage of scaleability up to full PAT synTQ FM when the time is right.”

Designed for use on a single process, synTQ® Lite connects to instruments, multivariate packages (MVA) and control systems, as determined by the user. synTQ® is delivered already configured to suit the specific application with the appropriate adaptors and Orchestration in place. The installation can be executed by the client, or by Optimal, remotely from its Bristol headquarters, or onsite. Clients opting for the latter option benefit from Optimal’s user training option.

synTQ Lite is normally run from a desktop or similar machine and interfaces to the instrument, either via a PAT LAN or via a dedicated connection, and to a Manufacturing LAN (for the other synTQ system interfaces). The system is vendor neutral, and providing the device requiring connection has a communications interface and a known protocol, then synTQ Lite can connect to it.

Although designed to run a single unit operation, synTQ Lite can, nevertheless, store multiple instrument and MVA interfaces plus Orchestrations (PAT methods), but only one of each can be run at any one time. Moreover, because all models developed within synTQ Lite are fully transferable to synTQ FM, if, in the future, users need to change any of the adaptors to instruments, MVA package or control system, then this is perfectly possible, as is the opportunity to add to, or upgrade the Orchestration(s) within the system.

“We originally conceived synTQ Lite as an introductory package for PAT, only,” said Martin Gadsby: “a function that it is extremely well specified to fulfil. However, from initial installations of the system, synTQ® Lite has proven itself to clients using it in the areas of product development – and even on full production systems.”