Bio-firm research jobs go

7:00pm Wednesday 7th March 2012 in News

SIXTEEN research jobs have gone at gene therapy company Oxford BioMedica, but its workforce has been boosted after it opened a new drug manufacturing plant in Cowley.

A total of 83 staff are now based at Oxford Science Park in Littlemore after two jobs went at the companys US office in San Diego and 14 in Oxford.

BioMedica, which has its headquarters at the science park, paid 1.9m last February for a building in Transport Way, Cowley, left vacant by RecipharmCobra Biologics.

Another 1.7m has been spent on recommissioning the building with clean rooms that exclude microscopic impurities.

Chief executive John Dawson said: We very much regret the redundancies, but to ensure the long-term future of the company we have had to move the culture towards manufacturing and commercialisation.

There are some areas of long-term research which we have needed to trim back on.

He added: Until we reach sustainable profitability, we continue to strike a balance between growing the company while being careful with costs.

The company raised 20m from investors to fund the Cowley plant and enough cash to last until 2013. Its newly-released half-year results showed an 11m pre-tax loss.

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Bio-firm research jobs go

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