Having exhibited at INTERPHEX for many years, Veriteq, a provider of environmental monitoring and validation solutions, has made many connections with leading pharmaceutical and biotech companies. The Veriteq team attending INTERPHEX 2010, on April 20–22, was struck by two trends in the pharmaceutical industry that were especially apparent in this year’s show.

First and foremost, there’s good reason for optimism with capital equipment purchases, as they are a bellwether of the health of the pharmaceutical industry, specifically and to a certain extent, to the economy as a whole. While the number of attendees at the show continues to decline, who came to the show was notably different. Nearly all of my conversations at the event were with top-level managers who had authority and budgets to proceed with facility renovations. The near freeze on updating equipment to newer models—environmental monitoring instrumentation, refrigerator/freezers, chambers, incubators, etc.—throughout the industry in the past few years seems to be over.

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