Productive workforce lends appeal to manufacturing in Puerto Rico

In this Q&A, Healthcare Packaging (HCP) discusses the business climate on the island with well-known speaker and quick-changeover expert John Henry (JH), CPP. HCP: Please describe your packaging experience in Puerto Rico. JH: I was the engineering manager for Alcon Laboratories in Puerto Rico from 1976 to 1985. Since then I have owned a company that designs, sells, and services packaging machinery. For the past eight years I have also spent about half my time consulting on manufacturing effectiveness, particularly on changeover. I am a frequent speaker at PackExpo and other shows and conferences and have published a couple dozen articles on packaging, packaging machinery, changeover, and related topics. (Subscribe to the Quick Changeover newsletter.) HCP: How are drugs packaged and distributed in Puerto Rico compared with the process in the mainland United States? JH: In Puerto Rico, we do everything from compounding, including biotech and sophisticated processing synthesizing, to final end-user packaging. Different companies distribute differently. Some send truckloads to distribution centers in the United States and elsewhere. Others, and this was the case when I worked for Alcon, send orders as small as mixed product cases to individual pharmacies.