Core Technologies
Overview
DOTTIKON achieves and maintains technology performance leadership as specialist for hazardous reactions by constantly expanding its technology portfolio.
The technology portfolio is built around active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) and performance chemicals and comprises hazardous, low-temperature and high-pressure reactions as well as continuous processing. In all these technologies DOTTIKON offers profound know-how, extensive process development and manufacturing experience in the scale-up from kilograms to multi-tons and product launches as well as post-launch production transfers. DOTTIKON runs its technologies on dedicated and multipurpose equipment on all scales under ISO as well as cGMP conditions.
DOTTIKON seeks and establishes new reaction pathways by initial route-finding, designs and develops chemical processes, and manufactures innovative building blocks and products, based on our core technologies or combinations thereof. This enables rapid scale-up and cost-effective access to novel robust and sustainable processes with highly competitive quality and yields.
Hazardous Reactions
DOTTIKON is the leading specialist for hazardous reactions, highly exothermic processes, highly reactive compounds, thermally or mechanically unstable compounds or mixtures, and highly active compounds.
With over 110 years of experience with hazardous reactions, DOTTIKON persues a historically-grown comprehensive safety culture that makes the company the most trusted partner in the field of hazardous chemistry. Typical examples include azide chemistry, oxidations, hydrogenations and alkylations with highly exothermic processes and highly reactive, unstable or high-potent compounds.
Our safety lab applies 14 proprietary tests to gather safety data for the development of safe and robust processes, enabling reliable scale-up in dedicated facilities. The one-site facility concept for safe, cost-effective, reliable and sustainable manufacturing applying hazardous chemistry also includes waste treatment facilities.
Low-Temperature
DOTTIKON's profound knowledge and experience in low-temperature processes maximize selectivity and enable the cost-effective manufacturing of desired, complex molecules.
Low-temperature chemistry often means dealing with highly exothermic processes, highly reactive compounds or thermally unstable compounds or mixtures. Low-temperature processes enable kinetic reaction control and the formation of structures not selectively accessible via thermodynamics only. The respectives processes are conducted in dedicated equipment and allow DOTTIKON to scale up and convert unstable, highly reactive species into products – safely, without decomposition and forming undesired side products.
DOTTIKON has know-how and low-temperature equipment (glass and Hastelloy) on all scales for batch-wise as well as continuous processing
- Research & Development up to 0.5 l and down to –80 °C
- Small-scale & Pilot up to 160 l and down to –80 °C
- Production up to 1'600 l and down to –100 °C
High-Pressure
The application of high pressure, often in combination with elevated temperatures and heterogeneous or homogeneous catalysts, in chemical gas reactions open the doors to interesting chemical structures and building blocks such as amines, aldehydes, or nitroxides.
DOTTIKON offers profound expertise from conducting high-pressure reactions (H2, CO, NO, NH3, HNR2, CO2) over the past 60 years. More than 150 different projects have been scaled up to multi-ton production, including heterogeneous and homogeneous catalyses.
DOTTIKON has dedicated and corrosion-resistant equipment (stainless steel, glass-lined and Hastelloy) on all scales
- Research & Development with dedicated high-pressure lab with autoclaves up to 2 l and up to 100 bar
- Small-scale & Pilot up to 630 l and up to 60 bar
- Production up to 4'000 l and up to 50 bar
- High-pressure reactions, catalyst screening and scale-up capabilities
- Unique parallel autoclaves (6 x 100 ml)
- Experience and library with over 400 different catalysts
- Fully automated sampling system
- State-of-the-art and flexible data acquisition system
- Online process monitoring via FTIR on all scales
- Control of residual catalyst in product
- Buss loop technology enabling highly exothermic reactions without solvents
- Pump hydrogenation – continuous dosage of reagents, liquid or in solution, under pressure
- High-temperature and high-pressure reactions to prevent evaporation of solvents and reactants
Continuous Processing
Continuous processes are preferably used for hazardous reactions with fast kinetics or selectivity issues to keep the critical volumes small and the temperature distribution profile narrow.
DOTTIKON has more than 50 years of experience in continuous reactions using micro and tubular flow reactors. For fast hazardous reactions in particular (e.g., nitration, nitrate ester formation, oxidation, metallation), continuous processing enables the reduction of critical volumes while at the same time increasing the heat exchange capacity. The narrow temperature profile in continuous reactors improves reaction selectivity and enables safe hazardous reactions closer to the onset temperature than in batch processes. Experienced teams of engineers, process and analytical chemists on site in conjunction with the modular continuous equipment units allow DOTTIKON to rapidly scale up processes from kilograms to multi-tons per hour throughput in tailor-made equipment set-ups.
DOTTIKON has dedicated equipment for continuous process operations on various scales
- Chemical reactions throughput up to 2'000 kg/hour
- Separation and extraction throughput up to 12'000 kg/hour
