Pharmaceutical industry uses smart gateway in application with wireless monitoring

For many years, the recording of important variables in the pharmaceutical industry, such as the climatic monitoring of storage areas, was done manually, subject to human error. With the advancement of good practices and the emergence of strict pharmaceutical regulations, there has been an increase in the development and manufacture of devices capable of measuring and recording most variables in different environments.

A pharmaceutical company with two plants in Brazil, sought NOVUS for a solution capable of making climate monitoring more efficient, safe and reliable. Until that moment, they used thermo hygrometers scattered in the areas to be monitored, which required the availability of employees in different shifts to perform the task of recording the temperature at a certain time and place. This ended up delaying action on any unusual occurrence, such as a temperature excursion outside the specified limits. In addition, the method did not provide enough records for analysis and decision-making to improve the process.

Trusted records? We have the solution!

The application has wireless monitoring through wireless temperature and humidity sensors – RHT Air – a precise, compact and calibrable device that, because it does not need cables, becomes an economical and flexible option. In addition, the FieldLogger data logger was used , which guarantees the availability and security of data in a contingency situation. Supervision was carried out by the SCADA SuperView software, a simple program to operate and use. But most importantly: the NOVUS solution meets the requirements of ANVISA and FDA in terms of access control, data integrity, traceability, registration and electronic signature.

The key point for implementation was the challenge given the breadth and segmentation of the company’s facilities. To this end, the need arose for a communication gateway that, like other devices, would be secure and robust, and would allow wireless communication, avoiding changes in the customer’s infrastructure.

Thus, the device chosen was the AirGate Modbus , an intelligent and robust gateway with communication with a range of up to 1,000 meters. The AirGate Modbus operates through the NOVUS-Air protocol (IEEE 802.15.4), own industrial wireless network, making it completely independent of the customer’s IT infrastructure. Its communication has security in data traffic, guaranteed by 128-bit encryption, and it is intelligent, because it uses the lowest frequency bands available, offering stability and reliability in the communication link.