Ventilators breathe life into maker’s first profits

A VENTILATOR maker owned by banking giant Goldman Sachs has turned its first profit in more than a decade after being handed a £136m Government contract.

Intermed, which owns medical device manufacturer Penlon, made a £1.1m profit in the year to March 31 after it was paid to produce up to 15,000 ventilators in the fight against the pandemic.

In accounts filed this week, Intermed said it supplied 11,683 ventilators to the NHS between April and July, generating over £100m and leading to a ‘considerable upside in sales and profit’.

But many ventilators were not immediately needed. A separate Government contract showed that logistics firm DHL was handed a £523,594 contract to keep some ventilators in a warehouse.

Intermed and Penlon’s auditor EY resigned this year, saying it had not seen ‘sufficient audit evidence’ to explain why it valued a loss-making subsidiary at £11.5m.

Justin Madders, Labour MP and shadow health minister, said: ‘There is a concerning attitude around the Government’s response to Covid that does begin to look like too little attention was paid to the basics of due diligence and value for money, which means some firms have disproportionately profited from the crisis.’

The Government said: ‘We have done whatever it takes to protect the NHS and save lives, including ensuring everyone who needed a ventilator had access to one.

‘The NHS now has access to over 30,000 mechanical and 15,000 noninvasive ventilators, more than three times as many as it had at the start of the pandemic.’

Goldman’s private equity arm owns a majority stake in Penlon and Intermed parent company BPL Medical Technologies.