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Premium Pharmaceutical Sugar Spheres & Globuli Sacchari
Pharmaceutical Excipients Manufactured to GMP Standards.
10 reasons why you should decide to work with us.
Our mission.
Manufacturing high-quality sugar spheres and globuli sacchari with unmatched sphericity, mechanical strength, and international compliance.
Years of Excellence
Standard Sizes
Customized sizes for sugar spheres possible
Export countries
Get to know our products
Your Partner for Pharmaceutical Carriers: Sugar Spheres & Globuli Sacchari
Pharm-a-spheres™ specializes in two essential pharmaceutical excipients: Sugar Spheres for advanced drug delivery systems and Globuli Sacchari for homeopathic medicine. Both product lines represent the pinnacle of pharmaceutical manufacturing – combining 70+ years of expertise with ISO 9001-certified production and IPEC GMP compliant manufacturing.
Our sugar spheres provide the optimal foundation for sustained-release, modified-release, and controlled-release formulations, available in sizes from 100 µm to 2 mm. Our globuli sacchari serve as pure, inert carriers for homeopathic preparations, conforming to HAB standards and available in all traditional formulations.
Sugar spheres
Best carrier for your sustained-release formulation in a unique quality, based on a highly controlled and certificated manufacturing process.
Globuli sacchari
Basic for your homoeopathic medicine free of excipients and preservatives and available in nearly every size for your production.
Who we are what we do
About Pharm-a-spheres™ - Decades of Pharmaceutical Excellence
Hanns G. Werner GmbH + Co. KG is a medium-sized, family-owned company, specialized on spheres. For more than 70 years our company is growing at the site in Tornesch, near the city of Hamburg. On an area of more than 11,000 square meters we are manufacturing 6,000 t of spheres per year.
Dedicated production side
Pharm-a-spheres™ sugar spheres and Globuli Sacchari are individually produced in dedicated production sides. No API’s involved or other raw materials in this production departments.
Internal Lab
With our own laboratory we ensure highest quality of our products. Quality Made-in-Germany. Furthermore service is quicker, flexible and is not dependent on third party. In addition special parameters are possible (on request and for a fee).
Custom made items
Besides our huge range of standard-sizes. Individual particle size distribution (PSD) is possible. These new items will be provided quickly. It is one of our strengths to provide such individual and customized products (please be informed about higher minimum order quantity).
High skills in export
Pharm-a-spheres™ had been grown over the decades. Since its beginning we exported our goods world-wide. That’s why there are a high education and a lot of skills for exporting our products.
FAQ about our products
What you always wanted to know about our products
Find quick answers to the most common inquiries about our products and quality standards.
What is the most common composition of neutral spheres used as core for active pellets?
Sucrose and corn starch are substances also commonly used as food ingredients and widely available in the necessary pharmaceutical quality. They are natural substances made from sugar beet or sugar cane and maize. Sucrose and starch are safe, non-toxic excipients. In the intestine they are digestible, and in the environment completely biodegradable. This meets the customer’s expectation for clean label products.
Sucrose is related to dental caries and diabetes, isn’t it?
Sugar spheres become part of an orally administered drug form that is swallowed (as hard gelatine capsules or matrix tablets). There is no relevant contact to the teeth. The total quantity of sucrose in the daily doses is neglectable in comparison to the carbon hydrates in the food and has no adverse effect on patients suffering from diabetes.
Any technological good reasons to make spheres from sucrose and starch?
Indeed, building-up the spheres by crystallization of sucrose enables us to manufacture mechanically very resistant particles. Attrition and breakage in the course of further processing are significantly reduced in comparison to spheres made by agglomeration of insoluble substances with the help of binding agents.
We want the spheres dissolve clearly in water…
Sucrose is easily soluble in water, but corn starch forms a cloudy suspension. When swallowed, this is completely irrelevant. However, if spheres are meant to get dissolved prior to use, we recommend the larger globuli sacchari, made solely from soluble sucrose, as alternative.
Does the hygroscopic starch interfere with water-sensitive active substances?
Definitely, no! The sugar spheres are dried in the manufacturing process to a water activity below 0.6. The residual water is bound firmly to the starch and is not available for chemical reactions. Furthermore, it would be possible to insulate the spheres’ surface prior to coating with sensitive API.
I heard about MCC spheres …
MCC is microcrystalline cellulose. There is no economic, chemical nor technological reason to use these instead of the proven sugar spheres. A saving of time in the coating process is a rumor.
Some applications need spheres made of tartaric acid?
There are formulations on the market that combine the API load on the spheres with pH lowering tartaric acid as core to improve the solubility and bioavailability of the drug substance. In this case we propose a combination of sugar spheres coated with API and sugar spheres coated with tartaric acid, combined in the same capsule.
Okay, I am nearly convinced, but the registration documents do not cover this alternative!
Let’s talk about scientific facts, not formal pseudo-problems.
What is your personal opinion about all this?
After more than 50+ years of worldwide experience with sugar spheres I can honestly summarize, that there was no pellet formulation task that could not be solved with sugar spheres. Spheres of other composition were often defeated and had their specific own problems like availability, purity, stability, and others.