Avra occupies it's own premises in one of the industrial layouts flanking the Indian city of Hyderabad. Currently, there are two sites referred to as Unit I and Unit II. Avra's facilities, with a full complement of clean rooms, kilo-labs, pilot plants and a large-scale production unit, support the work of inspired teams of scientists and chemical technologists, who have been successful in producing molecules involving multi-step (up to 25 steps) syntheses. Avra blends strengths in fundamental chemistry with dexterity in technology applications, pursuing its belief that understanding and improving fundamental chemical processes will help innovate and develop better technologies.

At Unit I, the R&D laboratories and pilot plant facilities occupy a built-up area of 45,000 sq.ft. The facility comprises 14 dedicated research labs of 600 sq.ft. each, Class-100,00 clean room for kilo quantity product manufacture (including APIs), pilot plant, quality control and quality assurance infrastructure. The facility can house ca.70 scientists along with support staff. The library, conference room, lecture hall, stores and an administrative cell complement the technology infrastructure. The laboratory is capable of carrying out a variety of chemical reactions.

The R&D laboratory at the Avra Unit II site will have a built-up area of 13,000 sq.ft. It will house ca.150 scientific and support staff. The facility comprises research labs, kilo-labs (with 100 L glass assembly units), hydrogenation rooms, conference rooms, stores, and quality control infrastructure.

The state-of-the-art pilot plant has 8 reactors ranging from 250 L to 2000 L (SS and glass-lined), producing multi-kilo batch products. The Class-100,000 area attached to the pilot plant can handle centrifugation, drying, micronisation, blending and packing activities, adhering to international cGMP stands. The clean rooms are fitted with HEPA filters and dedicated air handling systems fully capable for handling APIs under pharmacopoeia standards.

Reactors

All Glass Assembly Set up

Avra's steroid facility is a Class-100, 000 totally contained unit with a built-up area of 5,000 sq.ft. This manufacturing site has been designed and constructed by Meissner + Wurst Zander, a German based clean room total facility solution provider. Full protection pressurized suits with carbon monoxide filtration systems are provided to all personnel. Manufacturing of steroidal products will be in compliance with FDA standards of cGMP.

Utilities include a diesel-fired boiler, -20^Oc chilling unit, air compressor, vacuum pumps, etc. Full protection pressurized suits with carbon monoxide filtration systems are provided to all personnel. Manufacturing of steroidal products will be in compliance with FDA standards of cGMP.

Plant area 4200 Sq.ft.

Reactor

The production facility will have a built-up area of 6,000 sq.ft. The infrastructure will include 26 reactors (glass-lined and SS-type) ranging in sized between 250 L - 3000 L capacity, complemented with centrifuges, filtration and drying systems. The hydrogenation plant will be equipped with reactors in a size range between 250 L - 1000 L, operating at pressures up to 225 psi. The facility will be capable to produce a variety of compounds on a scale between 10 kg - 3000 kg per month, whilst adhering to cGMP guidelines.

In order to ensure total compliance with international standards, Avra has implemented comprehensive documentation for Standard Operating Procedures, Protocols, Test Method Documentation, Limit Specifications and Qualifications for equipment, instruments, validation profiles and recording systems.

The Indian Institute of Chemical Technology (IICT) and the Center for Cellular and Molecular Biology share one of India's best Scientific libraries. Avra's research laboratories are located just 2 km from the IICT and Avra's scientists are permitted to use the library facilities after payment of an annual fee.

The library has an extensive collection of resource material in the fields of modern biology, chemistry, chemical engineering, and related areas, comprising 39,930 books, 38,452 bound volumes of periodicals and 1,74,000 Indian Patent Specifications. In addition to several volumes of classical journals dating back to the 19th century, complete sets of Science Citation Index (from 1945); Chemical abstracts (from 1970) are available. The library has an in-house bindery and reprographic facility. More than 557 Journals are subscribed every year. The IICT- CCMB library has established contacts with various national and international document delivery centers such as INSDOC, British Library Document Supply Centre, Derwent Information Ltd. and National Library of Australia, in addition to local libraries, for meeting the requirements of the scientists. The documentation group provides online literature searches from over 500 databases available on hosts like DIALOG (USA), STN International (USA), DATASTAR (Switzerland) and ESA-IRS (Italy). The library continues to provide bibliographic service from the weekly database, Current Contents on Diskettes (Life Sciences; Physical, Chemical and Earth Sciences editions). Other services provided by the library include bibliometric analysis of research papers; and arrangements for translation of scientific literature published in a foreign language The Indian Institute of Chemical Technology (IICT) and the Center for Cellular and Molecular Biology share one of India's best scientific libraries. Avra's research laboratories are located just 2 km from the IICT and Avra's scientists are allowed to use the library facilities after payment of an annual fee.

Avra's scientists also use in-house computers (with high speed internet connections) with access to literature search tools such as MDL CrossFire – Beilstein.