New medicines R&D centre in Scotland to get £20m to set up

Oligonucleotide Manufacturing Innovation Centre of Excellence to be based at innovation district in Renfrewshire

Scotland will see a new centre of excellence set up for cutting-edge medicines after chancellor Jeremy Hunt awarded the scheme £10 million in his autumn statement yesterday.

The centre, which will be jointly funded by the UK and Scottish governments, will develop innovative and sustainable manufacturing techniques for oligonucleotides, which are short, single- or double-stranded DNA or RNA molecules. Scottish Enterprise, an agency of the Scottish government, will supply a further £10m.