(Alliance News) - Genedrive PLC on Tuesday said its loss widened sharply in the first half of its financial year as commercialisation of its hepatitis C virus test proved slow, and there were delays in shipping orders.
Shares in Genedrive dropped 45% to just 11.50 pence, having last closed a 21.00 pence.
For the six months ended December 31, the molecular diagnostics company posted a GBP3.3 million loss, widened from GBP1.7 million, as revenue and other income plummeted to just GBP627,000 from GBP1.5 million.
Commercialising Genedrive's HCV ID kit, which tests for the hepatitis C virus, has remained slow and there were delays on shipping orders to the US Department of Defense. These issues meant sales were unable to make up for a drop in revenue after Genedrive's grant-funded programmes expired.
Chief Executive David Budd said: "The Genedrive instrument has been proven to perform exceptionally well in the field as demonstrated in HCV study data and [antibiotic induced hearing loss] CE marking studies. The challenge for us remains exploiting its performance and driving revenues as we progress to our strategic goal of material revenues from our assays.
"We are very excited in the potential of AIHL, which has obtained CE marking in the period, and whilst we are cautious on meeting our short-term revenue expectations, we also remain confident in the long-term potential of the [US Department of Defense] and the HCV markets and are keenly focused on this important next stage of the company's evolution."
By Anna Farley; annafarley@alliancenews.com
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Genedrive (GDR)