Companies: AMS   

Advanced Medical Solutions is considering ‘suitable acquisitions’ after hoisting annual profits from £27,000 to nearly £600,000.

AIM-quoted Advanced Medical, which uses in-house natural and synthetic polymer technology for ‘advanced wound dressings’, increased turnover by 11 per cent last year to £14.3 million and, having turned £990,000 losses into a tiny profit in 2005, achieved 2006 pre-tax profits of £569,000. The company, whose earnings rose from 0.19p to 0.52p a share, launched new ‘silver alginate’ products in Europe and the USA with strategic partners, silver being a ‘broad spectrum anti-microbial’ effective against bugs such as MRSA, and alginate a polymer derived from seaweed.

Chairman Dr Geoffrey Vernon says the company, which last year doubled the number of NHS trusts using its ActivHeal product range to 40, has teamed up with Kimberley-Clark Health Care, a global leader in infection control in the operating theatre, to attack the ‘exciting’ surgical skin sealant market. Advanced Medical has also made progress in securing US regulatory approval for its LiquiBand tissue adhesives range and Vernon says the company expects to enter the US market next year.

He also makes it clear that the company, which ended 2006 with £4.5 million cash, intends to use its profitability and cash flow to consider ‘suitable acquisitions to leverage AMS’s technology and distribution base’. Recommended by Growth Company Investor last August at 10.5p, AMS shares have now reached 15.75p, valuing the company at £22.4 million, and could go further.