bench-scale laboratory or pilot plant. Furthermore, it has to be adapted to the specific characteristics of available production trains. Bench-scale Laboratory, kg-lab and Pilot Plant Development. Depending on the volume requirements, three different types of equipment are used for process research, development and optimization, namely bench-scale laboratories for gram to 100 gram, kilo-labs for kg to 10 kg and pilot plants for 100 kg to ton quantities. Particularities of laboratory processes that have to be eliminated include the use of large numbers of unit operations, dilute reaction mixtures, vast quantities of solvents for extraction, evaporation to dryness, drying of solutions with hygroscopic salts. Although modern reaction calorimeters consent to foresee the effects of these different conditions to a certain extent, a direct transfer of a process from the laboratory to the industrial scale is not recommended, because of the inherent safety, environmental, and economic risks. In development, the viability of the process on a semi commercial scale has to be demonstrated. Trial quantities of the new fine chemical have to be manufactured for market development, clinical tests, and other requirements. The necessary data have to be generated to enable the engineering department to plan the modifications of the industrial-scale plant and in order to calculate production costs for the expected large-volume requirements. Both equipment and plant layout of the pilot plant reflect those of an industrial multipurpose plant, except for the size of reaction vessels (bench-scale laboratory ~10–60 liters; pilot plant ~100–2500 liters) and the degree of process automation. Before the process is ready for transfer to the industrial-scale plant, the following activities have to be completed: Adaptation of the laboratory process to the constraints of a pilot plant, hazard and operability (HAZOP) analysis, execution of demonstration batches. The main differences between laboratory synthesis and industrial scale production are shown in Table 4. In case of cGMP fine chemicals also a process validation is required. It consists of the three elements process design, process qualification and continued process verification. Process Optimization. Once a new chemical process has been introduced successfully on an industrial scale, process optimization is called upon to improve the economics. As a rule of thumb it should be attempted to reduce the costs of goods sold (COGS) by 10-20%, every time the yearly production quantity has doubled. The task extends from fine tuning the currently used synthetic method all the way to the search for an entirely