The Lab Trial Passed.
Production Failed.
Three months into my pharma career, I learned one of the most expensive lessons I would ever encounter — a passed lab trial does not mean you are ready for production.
4 min read
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Ahmed Nabil — Founder, Know-How Academy
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30 June 2026
The Lesson — Before You Read the Story
A passed lab trial confirms your formula. It does not confirm your manufacturing process.
If your R&D and production equipment differ — even slightly — your lab results may not hold at scale. Most companies only discover this after the first rejected batch.
The Story
This photo was taken around three months after I joined the pharmaceutical industry. I was junior, confident, and about to experience one of the most expensive lessons of my career.
We had developed an enteric-coated tablet in the lab. It passed every dissolution test. The team approved it for production. Nobody asked whether the production equipment was the same as what we had used in development.
It was not. And that gap cost us an entire batch.
What Happened
During production coating, the tablets kept sticking to the pan wall. The coating film was being damaged every time. We adjusted parameters, sprayed more coating material, sent samples repeatedly to QC. Hours passed. The problem continued.
The batch eventually reached the required coating weight. It still failed the dissolution test. Everything was rejected.
Materials Lost
Full batch of API and excipients
Days Wasted
Production time, QC hours, management attention
Schedule Disrupted
Launch timeline pushed back
Why It Happened
Our lab had used a conventional coating pan. Production used a perforated coating pan — a fundamentally different machine with different airflow, spray dynamics, and operating behaviour.
We had copied the lab process to production. We should have translated it.
"The machines were not simply different in size. They were fundamentally different in operation — and nobody checked."
More than 20 years later, I still see companies make this exact mistake.
A successful lab trial leads directly to a production batch. No one reviews whether the production equipment matches what was used in development. The batch fails. The same investigation starts from zero. The same materials are wasted. The same schedule slips.
Check This Before Your Next Scale-Up
Is the production equipment the same type as what R&D used — or just similar in name?
Has the process been translated for the production machine, not just copied from the lab?
Has an engineering batch been run under real production conditions before commercial materials are committed?
Email
Ahmed Nabil
Founder, Know-How Academy | KH Scientific Solutions
20+ years in pharmaceutical development across generic drug formulation, scale-up, technology transfer, and regulatory-driven product development in MENA and GCC markets.
Connect on LinkedInMy Pharma Failure Story #1
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