Award for international trade recognises outstanding, world-class drug development services

The Prime Minister’s office has announced that Propath, a trusted specialist in molecular pathology for biopharmaceutical research and development, is to receive a Queen’s Award for Enterprise in recognition of the company’s exceptional contribution to the UK’s Life Sciences sector. 

As the UK’s most prestigious business accolade, the Queen’s Award is presented to those companies that demonstrate outstanding growth and achievement in business. Propath was selected to receive the award based on its sustained service innovation and expansion, especially its success in delivering specialist research services to the global biopharmaceutical sector.

Positioned right at the heart of the rapidly growing and promising field of immunotherapy, Propath’s success story spans across 35 years. Drawing on its unique and specialist knowledge in molecular pathology and GLP-compliant histopathology, Propath has become a trusted drug development partner of many of the world’s leading pharmaceutical and biotech companies across the globe. One particular area offering great promise within today’s drug development industry is immuno-oncology, which involves the use of a new class of antibody-based therapies targeted at improving clinical outcomes for patients with cancer. Propath has excelled in this area, combining its key assets, internal experts, experience, methodologies and best practices to provide a service of exceptional value to the sector. 

The assessment of antibody tissue cross-reactivity (TCR) is just one of Propath’s services that has become a key step in demonstrating the safety of novel immuno-therapeutic candidates, including innovative molecular structures such as nanobodies and antibody-drug-conjugates, enabling them to progress into clinical trials. TCR studies provide an understanding of the on- and off-target binding profile of a drug candidate, allowing researchers to predict how the immunotherapy is likely to perform in vivo. Through the expert services at Propath, pharmaceutical companies are able to efficiently evaluate the tissue specificity of these potential drugs to ensure that they are suitable and safe for clinical trials before being taken onto the next stage of the development pipeline.

“Propath has invested consistently over many years to support the growth of its molecular pathology research services for drug development. This award not only reflects our success in become the UK’s centre of excellence for TCR studies, but also one of the few centres across Europe able to perform studies of this type”, commented Dr Krish Soni, Chief Executive of Propath. “We believe in hiring the most talented scientists, from PhD to graduate level both locally and across Europe, allowing them to also benefit from the years of experience held within our specialist team. And it’s that experience and expertise, coupled with our strong service ethos that really sets us apart and enables our partners to accelerate the development of their most promising drug candidates.”         

Currently partnering with six of the world’s top ten pharmaceutical companies, as well as numerous other small- to mid-sized biotech companies, the insights gained by Propath across its broad client portfolio enables partnering companies to de-risk and accelerate their development projects. As the UK prepares to leave the European Union, the Government has stated the importance of the Life Science sector to the UK economy, including companies such as Propath, representing the UK’s strengths in the sector and exporting specialist, knowledge-intensive services globally.

“It’s incredibly exciting and rewarding to work with our clients on some of their most promising and innovative new therapies. Over the years many of these research projects have progressed through clinical trials and are now improving the lives of patients globally – which is what inspires us and what we really care about. We’re tremendously proud and honoured to receive this prestigious award, which is a testament to the brilliant team we have at Propath”, commented Dr Soni.

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