How TEA Navigator supports Pharmaceutical Manufacturing

Every technical decision has an economic consequence. TEA Navigator helps you understand both, before the investment is made.

TEA Navigator supports early-stage technology and manufacturing decisions, where many alternatives are being considered and detailed business cases do not yet exist.

It links technical choices, such as process design, equipment selection, yields, energy consumption, and cycle time—directly to economic outcomes including COGS and profitability. This is especially valuable during R&D and concept development, when finance may not yet have built a detailed financial model.

Questions answered

• Can the planned process achieve the target operating margin?
• What are the largest contributors to COGS and operating profit?
• What are the largest contributors to fluid-bed drying cost?
• What production volume is required to reach a 30% operating margin?
• How sensitive is profitability to API cost?
• How do material properties and process conditions affect granule drying?
• How long does tablet-core equilibration require?
• How do coating conditions affect moisture and temperature profiles?

Economic analysis

Build the process

Create the block flow diagram and enter ingredients, losses, equipment, labor, energy, throughput, and unit-operation assumptions.

Review the P&L

The Sankey view shows how revenue is divided among ingredients, packaging, operating expenses, depreciation, and operating profit.

Drill down into fluid-bed drying

Review depreciation, labor, facilities, overhead, utilities, and waste for the selected unit operation.

Evaluate production scale

Determine how operating margin changes with annual production volume and whether the 30% target is achievable.

Test API-cost sensitivity

Compare API price changes across production volumes and identify scenarios that meet or miss the target margin.

Process modeling

The same project connects the economic model to heat and moisture-transfer simulations for critical unit operations.

Fluid-bed drying

Predict center, average, and surface temperature and moisture in spherical granules.

Tablet-core equilibration

Resolve temperature and moisture redistribution through the tablet radius and height.

Film coating

Evaluate thermal and moisture gradients during coating and drying.

What this example demonstrates

• One project connects the block flow diagram, P&L, cost drill-down, sensitivity, and process modeling.
• Cost drivers can be traced from the total P&L to individual unit operations.
• Production scale strongly affects operating margin.
• Process-model results can support decisions on time, conditions, capacity, and yield.