DRUG discovery and development company, e-Therapeutics increased its half-year losses but said it is experiencing "significant progress".
The Tyneside business, originally a Newcastle University spin-out company, made a net loss of £1.8m for the six months to the end of July, compared to £1.5m in the same period last year.
But it has started clinical trials in the UK and US for a cancer drug which is currently the company’s most important product and it expects the first data from them before the end of 2012.
The company said the increased losses were a reflection of increased investment in the business.
Chief executive, Prof Malcolm Young, said: “This has been another period of significant progress. In the past six months we have advanced our most important product, the cancer drug ETS2101, into two phase I trials.
“We have also continued to re-shape our drug pipeline, with a clear determination to focus investment into the most promising assets in our discovery and development portfolios.
“We now look forward to some major clinical milestones and to new outputs from our unique drug discovery platform in network pharmacology.”
