ICH-Q7 Good Manufacturing Practice Guidance for Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients

This document is intended to provide guidance regarding good manufacturing practice (GMP) for the manufacturing of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) under an appropriate system for managing quality. It is also intended to help ensure that APIs meet the quality and purity characteristics that they purport, or are represented, to possess. 

This guidance applies to the manufacture of APIs for use in human drug (medicinal) products. It applies to the manufacture of sterile APIs only up to the point immediately prior to the APIs being rendered sterile. The sterilization and aseptic processing of sterile APIs are not covered by this guidance, but should be performed in accordance with GMP guidance's for drug (medicinal) products as defined by local authorities. 

This guidance covers APIs that are manufactured by chemical synthesis, extraction, cell culture/fermentation, recovery from natural sources, or any combination of these processes. 

An API starting material is a raw material, an intermediate, or an API that is used in the production of an API and that is incorporated as a significant structural fragment into the structure of the API. An API starting material can be an article of commerce, a material purchased from one or more suppliers under contract or commercial agreement, or produced inhouse. API starting materials normally have defined chemical properties and structure. 

The company should designate and document the rationale for the point at which production of the API begins. For synthetic processes, this is known as the point at which API starting materials are entered into the process. For other processes (e.g., fermentation, extraction, purification), this rationale should be established on a case-by-case basis.

This Guide applies to the manufacture of APIs for use in human drug (medicinal) products. It applies to the manufacture of sterile APIs only up to the point immediately prior to the APIs being rendered sterile. The sterilization and aseptic processing of sterile APIs are not covered by this guidance, but should be performed in accordance with GMP guidelines for drug (medicinal) products as defined by local authorities. This Guide covers APIs that are manufactured by chemical synthesis, extraction, cell culture/fermentation, by recovery from natural sources, or by any combination of these processes. Specific guidance for APIs manufactured by cell culture/fermentation is described in Section 18.

This Guide excludes all vaccines, whole cells, whole blood and plasma, blood and plasma derivatives (plasma fractionation), and gene therapy APIs. However, it does include APIs that are produced using blood or plasma as raw materials. Note that cell substrates (mammalian, plant, insect or microbial cells, tissue or animal sources including transgenic animals) and early process steps may be subject to GMP but are not covered by this Guide. In addition, the Guide does not apply to medical gases, bulk-packaged drug (medicinal) products, and manufacturing/control aspects specific to radiopharmaceuticals. Section 19 contains guidance that only applies to the manufacture of APIs used in the production of drug (medicinal) products specifically for clinical trials (investigational medicinal products). An “API Starting Material” is a raw material, intermediate, or an API that is used in the production of an API and that is incorporated as a significant structural fragment into the

structure of the API. An API Starting Material can be an article of commerce, a material purchased from one or more suppliers under contract or commercial agreement, or produced in-house. API Starting Materials normally have defined chemical properties and structure.

The company should designate and document the rationale for the point at which production of the API begins. For synthetic processes, this is known as the point at which "API Starting Materials" are entered into the process. For other processes (e.g. fermentation, extraction, purification, etc), this rationale should be established on a case- by-case basis. Table 1 gives guidance on the point at which the API Starting Material is normally introduced into the process. From this point on, appropriate GMP as defined in this Guide should be applied to these  intermediate and/or API manufacturing steps. This would include the validation of critical

process steps determined to impact the quality of the API. However, it should be noted that the fact that a company chooses to validate a process step does not necessarily define that step as critical.

The guidance in this document would normally be applied to the steps shown in gray in Table 1. It does not imply that all steps shown should be completed. The stringency of GMP in API manufacturing should increase as the process proceeds from early API steps to final steps, purification, and packaging. Physical processing of APIs, such as granulation, coating or physical manipulation of particle size (e.g. milling, micronizing), should be conducted at least to the standards of this Guide.

This GMP Guide does not apply to steps prior to the introduction of the defined "API Starting Material".