Drugs firm's £1m grant aid boost

Protherics employs 140 people in Ceredigion

A drugs company in Ceredigion has been awarded a £1m grant by the Welsh Assembly Government to help develop potentially life-saving medication.

Protherics, based at Ffostrasol near Llandysul, will use the money to support the manufacture of a drug treating sepsis or septic shock.

The life-threatening condition affects three million people a year worldwide.

The company employs 140 people and signed a global rights deal to manufacture the drug, CytoFab, in 2005.

The assembly government money has come via its SMARTCymru grant aid programme.

The investment will mean jobs are secured and new posts will be created in the long-term, but it is unclear how many at the moment.

It will provide investment and employment opportunities in Wales Enterprise minister Andrew Davies

Dr Andrew Heath, chief executive of Protherics, said he was pleased the drug's potential had been recognised.

He added: "The SMARTCymru grant will assist us to develop our manufacturing processes in Ceredigion and contribute to making what we believe is an important new treatment available to sepsis patients worldwide."

Andrew Davies, enterprise minister, said Protherics was at the "cutting edge" of biopharmaceutical development and manufacture.

"CytoFab has the potential to save millions of lives and we are proud to support its development and manufacture at Protherics' facility in Ceredigion.

"It will provide investment and employment opportunities in Wales and also extend the company's ability to develop and produce other important drugs here in the future."

Protherics which was formed in 1999 from the merger of Proteus International Plc and Therapeutic Antibodies Inc, already markets an antidote to rattlesnake bites.