LONDON, June 10, 2002 (PRIMEZONE) -- Amersham plc (LSE:AHM) (NYSE:AHM) (OSE:AHM), a world leader in medical diagnostics and life sciences, will invest an additional 46.5 million pounds to expand Amersham Health's production site at Lindesnes. This expansion comes only nine months after the official opening of a new 24 million pounds production line at the Norwegian site.
"This is the largest single manufacturing investment we have ever made and reflects two strong commitments. Firstly our commitment to consistently supply our customers worldwide with high quality products whose use is growing rapidly to diagnose a broad range of diseases. Secondly our continued commitment to Norway and to Lindesnes our people there and to the surrounding communities who have provided a facility that meets the highest regulatory standards," said John Padfield, CEO of Amersham Health.
"Global demand for our products is greater than we can meet in the years ahead without a significant increase in production capacity," said Ase Aulie Michelet, President of Amersham Health AS and global head for manufacturing and supply chain for the company. "Our Lindesnes plant represents the very latest in technology and effective process control in the world in our field, and this latest expansion approval is a quantum leap in our company's investment at Lindesnes."
The Lindesnes plant supplies the world market with bulk substances for both xray and magnetic resonance imaging contrast media. The bulk substance is manufactured into finished products at sites in Oslo, Ireland, China, Japan and the U.S.. The new production plant is planned to be completed in 2005 and will produce bulk chemicals for the company's Omnipaque(TM) and Visipaque(TM) xray contrast products. Omnipaque(TM), launched 20 years ago and still the best selling product on the market, reached sales of 222 million pounds last year, an increase of 10 per cent over the prior year. Visipaque(TM), a third generation xray product offering improved comfort for cardiac and other patients, had sales of 80 million pounds , up by 28 per cent on 2000.
Amersham plc (LSE:AHM) (NYSE:AHM) (OSE:AHM) is a world leader in medical diagnostics and in life sciences. Headquartered in the U.K., the company had annual sales of 1.6 billion pounds (U.S. $2.3 billion) in 2001 and 9,000 employees worldwide. Its strategy is to build its position as a leading provider of products and technologies enabling disease to be better understood, diagnosed earlier and treated more effectively. Amersham bringing vision to medical discovery For more information, visit our website at www.amersham.com