Biotangents gets £1.5m injection for new product
● Fresh funding led by investment syndicate Kelvin Capital and SIB
A medical diagnostics business based just outside Edinburgh has secured a £1.5 million funding injection to accelerate the roll out of its livestock disease diagnostic product.
Biotangents, which is based at the Pentlands Science Park, has developed technology that provides vets with the ability to diagnose potentially fatal diseases in cattle, on-site and within the same day. Traditional processes involve offsite lab testing which can take up to seven days for results to come in, increasing the risk of other animals b ecoming infected.
Led by the investment syndicate Kelvin Capital, and with Scottish Investment Bank participation, the oversubscribed funding round will suppor t t h e c o n t i n u e d c o mmer c i a l development of the firm’s diagnostic platform technology.
T h e c a s h w i l l b e u s e d t o l a u n c h i t s i n i t i a l p r o d u c t s , which have been developed in-house, onto the market.
The Kelvin Capital syndicate, led by directors John Mcnicol and Angus Hay, represents private investors in the UK, Europe and the US.
Alan Hale, chief executive at Biotangents, said: “The global medical diagnostics market is vast and presents a range of opportunities for us to become a global leader in the engineering of biology to produce fast, sensitive, reliable and easy-touse diagnostic products.
“We already know that our diagnostic platform technolo g y c a n h ave a r e a l impact on identifying infectious diseases, quickly, in animals and that our patent pending design can be adapted for use in many other products and applications.”
Mcnicol said: “The diagnostics market for livestock infectious diseases is growing due to increasing awareness of the impact that disease outbreaks can have on food security and public health.
“We need only look back to the £8 billion cost of the 2001 foot and mouth disease outbreak to highlight the enormous cost that infectious diseases can have.
“We invested in Biotangents in its first round of funding in 2017 and we are delighted to continue to back the business with a further syndicate investment.
“It is a business that is not only bringing rapid improvements to livestock care leading to public health improvements but it is also disrupting a traditional industry.”
“The global medical diagnostics market is vast and presents a range of opportunities”
sreid@scotsman.com