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Oxford Biomedica, a university-based spin-off company specialising in gene therapy, is set to raise Pounds 5 million in share capital and to become a publicly quoted company on the Alternative Investment Market, writes Simon Targett.

The company has already raised Pounds 750,000. The new investment will allow the company to develop new products, recruit 30 staff over the next 12 months, and lease purpose-built office and laboratory space on the Oxford Science Park opened last week by deputy prime minister Michael Heseltine.

The company will be headed by Oxford professor Alan Kingsman, director of the retrovirus molecular biology group within Oxford's biochemistry department. It will exploit commercially the properties of viruses to deliver therapeutic genes to human cells in order to treat cancer, HIV, and neurodegenerative conditions such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases.