Medicines manufacturing in the UK to receive £54m sustainability boost

Innovate UK’s Sustainable Medicines Manufacturing Innovation Programme (SMMIP) is funding eight innovative R&D ‘Grand Challenge’ projects to make medicines manufacturing more efficient, smarter and sustainable. 

The Programme, part of 2024’s Voluntary Scheme for Branded Medicines Pricing, Access and Growth (VPAG), look to boost the country’s competitiveness in life sciences and advanced manufacturing, as outlined in the government’s latest Industrial Strategy released this summer.

Frank Millar, the Centre for Process Innovation (CPI)’s CEO said: “Sustainability in medicines manufacturing is vital to maintain leadership in the UK life sciences sector, enabling it to decarbonise and utilise more sustainable technologies. These collaborations bring together the expertise, scale-up capability and cross-sector partnerships needed to reduce waste and emissions while supporting UK exports and economic growth.” 

Developing the UK’s digital and sustainable capabilities in medicine manufacturing

CPI is partnering in five of these projects, which have a combined value of £44.9 million, from both government and industry funding.

These five projects span key focus areas for the sector: sustainable materials, digital manufacturing, automation and circular-economy innovation.

One is an initiative led by AstraZeneca UK, which aims to future-proof manufacturing and make it more sustainable, through integrating robotics, automation, AI and data-driven approaches. 

Innovate UK stated on the programme website that overall, SMMIP “will drive collaboration between organisations throughout the medicines manufacturing supply chain to stimulate innovation for sustainability improvements with the alignment to three core pillars as well as two critical enablers: i) regulation, ii) measurements, standards and data.”

Joe Edwards, ABPI Director, UK Competitiveness and Devolved Nations concluded: “The pharmaceutical industry’s investment into this programme shows our commitment to modern and sustainable manufacturing practices. We are backing the innovative ideas needed to build a resilient manufacturing base for the UK and improve how medicines are made.”

Meanwhile, the VPAG scheme itself, remains at the centre of a damaging battle between the UK Government and pharma over industry rebates.

For now, an extended deadline of 16 December has been set for companies submitting their notice to leave the VPAG scheme for 2026. However, exiting means firms will be subject to the Statutory Scheme for branded medicines.