Dysis Medical gets the green light for US sales

A SCOTTISH medical device maker is looking to grab a slice of the $450 million (£281m) American cervical cancer screening market after being given permission to sell its lead product in the United States.

Dysis Medical - which changed its name from Forth Photonics this month to match the name of its key device - has been selling its scanner in Europe for 18 months through 14 distributors.

Chief executive Alastair Atkinson now hopes to repeat the device's success in the US, where he will be targeting about 25,000 gynaecologists' and obstetricians' practices.

Atkinson said: "Clinical studies in the UK, Greece and the Netherlands have shown our device is 88 per cent effective, compared with about 50 per cent for existing methods.

"As well as targeting the US, we're looking at Brazil, India, Russia and China. In these emerging markets, doctors are looking to use the latest technology so we have a big opportunity."

He declined to reveal sales and profits figures for Dysis, whose major shareholders are NBGI Ventures, Albion Ventures and Scottish Enterprise.

The company was set up in 2002 by Costas Balas, a professor at Crete University and, while its registered office has always been in London, its lead product was principally developed in Greece.

Former chief executive Fiona Lowrie joined from Fife-based eye scanner maker Optos in 2008 and moved the firm to its present base in Livingston.