The UK's first open-access facility will soon be available for firms wanting to ramp up biotech processes. The UK's Centre for Process Innovation (CPI) is expanding the capacity of its National Industrial Biotechnology Facility (NIBF) in Wilton from 1 to 10 tons to provide startups and established businesses with equipment and expertise for proof-of-concept development. Companies will be able to use the facility—in which projects may be backed by governmental funding or by private contracts—to make pilot batches of molecules, to de-risk their technology or to figure out how to scale up production processes. “They might want to rent some space, they might want to use the equipment in collaboration with my team, or they might want us to develop a process package for implementation in a manufacturing plant,” says Chris Dowle, director of sustainable processing at CPI. “We're very flexible.” Similar sorts of services have been around for some time, he says, but the improved NIBF site will be a first in terms of the large scale and the versatility of the equipment. For instance, a bespoke continuous fermentation system will be on offer as well as 'plug and play' machinery that can purify biofuels and other potentially marketable biochemicals. The plant will not produce biotherapeutics. A similar project is being developed in Leuna, Germany by the Munich-based Fraunhofer Institute and is scheduled to open next year.