SPECIALIST DRUG TRIALS COMPANY MAKES COOL £1.5m INVESTMENT

SPECIALIST DRUG TRIALS COMPANY
MAKES COOL £1.5m INVESTMENT

'Biotec managing director Marc Weinzweig (centre) shows Broomfield & Alexander’s
Ravi Nalliah (left) and Mark Jones (right) some of the super-cooled drugs handled by the company'.

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A South Wales company which has developed a highly specialist niche market managing the certification, import and supply of temperature-sensitive drugs for trials in the UK is making a cool £1.5m investment in a new state-of-the-art facility in Bridgend.

Biotec Distribution Wales Limited is to create 27 new jobs in a purpose-built unit which will open on Bridgend Industrial Estate in April 2008.

The investment is being funded from bank facilities, a loan from Finance Wales, and the management team’s own investment.

The package also includes a £340,000 Regional Selective Assistance grant from the Welsh Assembly Government negotiated by professional advisors Broomfield & Alexander, who also helped the company with business planning and forecasts, and have been retained by Biotec to take them through the growth phase.

Deputy First Minister Ieuan Wyn Jones said: “I’m delighted that the Assembly Government was able to assist this very specialised and successful company to grow and to create more skilled jobs in an important sector.”

The company was established in 1997 and works on behalf of drug manufacturing companies in the USA, Canada, Israel and Japan which want to get their products into clinical trials in Europe, with the aim of eventually marketing them.

To do this as non-EU manufacturers, they are required to have their processes audited and their products certified by qualified individuals in the EU and by companies licensed to carry out these activities.

Biotec managing director Marc Weinzweig and his team provide this service, but have taken specialisation one step further by focusing on drugs which need to be packed, stored and transported at low temperatures – in some cases as cold as -80 degrees centigrade.

Operating extremely successfully in an expanding market, the company found itself increasingly hampered by limited space in its current building on the Brynmenyn Industrial Estate in Bridgend – hence the investment.

“We badly needed a new facility, more equipment and additional skilled people to realise the growth potential that our position in a niche market offers us,” said Mr Weinzweig.

“We’ve grown from a company serving six customers to one with some 35 clients, and our ability to grow further was limited. But the new unit will give us all the space, equipment and people we need to expand.

“The plan is that over the next three years, we will open a series of packing lines to enable us to significantly increase the volumes we handle, and in that process we will be creating 27 new jobs.”

B&A director Mark Jones said there were many excellent companies in Wales like Biotec whose expansion was only held up by the fact that they did not have sufficient funds.

“These firms are ideal candidates for Welsh Assembly support,” he said. “In Biotec’s case, the grant means everything to them in being able to progress their project – they wouldn’t have been able to do so without it.

“It means they are now going to be able to build state of the art premises, attract high quality staff and, most importantly, attract overseas clients who will perceive Biotec to be at the right level to place their business with them.”

If you are interested in accessing funding to grow your business please contact our corporate finance team on 029 2054 9939 or email them at funding@broomfield.co.uk

Date: 14th September