Genedrive surges after receiving £1.1mln in funding to finance development of its TB testing kit
"We are very appreciative of Innovate UK's support and recognition of our commitment to TB diagnostics," said Genedrive CEO, David Budd
Genedrive PLChas been awarded £1.1mln in funding by Innovate UK for product development of its Genedrive tuberculosis testing kit.
The grant will be used for the further development of a high-sensitivity bacterial sample preparation module for the Genedrive instrument.
Genedrive said it will treat the funding as income in its accounts, matched to costs incurred over the periods to 30 June 2018 and 2019.
The Genedrive mTB/RIF test is designed as a decentralised, point-of-need test to diagnose the presence of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in patient sputum samples.
The funding will support the development of a more streamlined work-flow that concentrates the patient sample prior to testing, with the goal of increasing sensitivity of the assay and reducing manufacturing costs.
The programme is anticipated to run for a one year period, after which the sample preparation solution will require formal performance and clinical validation.
“The market dynamics of molecular tuberculosis testing have not changed significantly since we first began developing the Genedrive mTB/RIF assay,” said David Budd, the chief executive officer of genedrive.
“We believe Genedrive can play an important role in supporting the management of TB, by meeting key assay performance criteria at a price point that does not require the subsidies that exist in market today. The Innovate UK funding is important in further developing the Genedrive mTB/RIF to meet the varied needs of the broad global markets to which we now have commercial channels," he added.
Northland Capital Partners said the Innovate UK award demonstrates the ability of the company to win competitive grant funding, highlighting the potential value of its mTB/RIF platform.
"TB is an urgent public health issue; over 10.4 million people were infected by TB in 2015 with c.1.8 million deaths. The development of the mTB/RIF platform shows genedrive has a healthy product pipeline. The company launched its Genedrive® HCV ID Kit, for testing Hepatitis C, at the beginning of 2018," it noted.
Shares in Genedrive were up 8.2% at 36.25p.
Source: Poactive Investors Limited