Tepnel Life Sciences today announced the completion of Phase II construction and launch of biopharmaceutical and clinical genotyping services at its Livingston facility.

Clinical genotyping is a growing area of genetic analysis with the potential to lead to personalised medicine.  It works by linking a patient's genetic makeup to their response to particular drugs, enabling specialists to establish which treatments will best benefit an individual.  Clinical genotyping also allows for the early identification of genetic disease.

The introduction of biopharmaceutical and genotyping services will give Tepnel access to these rapidly-growing markets, enabling the Company to offer complete service packages to clients across these two broad areas.

With these new capabilities, Tepnel will simultaneously increase the product development capabilities of its Molecular Diagnostics division and become one of the UK's leading providers to the pharmaceutical and molecular diagnostics sectors.

Tepnel's Chief Executive Officer, Ben Matzilevich, said "The completion of our state-of-the-art pharmaceutical testing facility in Livingston, Scotland will enable us to establish clinical genotyping and biopharmaceutical operations and expand our small molecule pharmaceutical service capabilities.  These capabilities are key to our long term growth strategy.

"We look forward to providing our pharmaceutical customers with a full line of in-house services that increases efficiency, maintains sample integrity and minimises the risks associated with inter-laboratory transfer."

Officially opened in September 2007, the £5 million Livingston pharmaceutical testing facility was part funded by Scottish Enterprise, Edinburgh and Lothian.