Aortech International, the medical device group that once employed hundreds of people in Lanarkshire, made a loss of $847,000 (£546,000) last year after paying out $1.9 million to holders of emergency bonds who rescued the company.
The bond-holders, who were promised a 100% return if the company survived, also have a 15% interest in Aortech's ultimate value.
Chairman Bill Brown, the former Edinburgh-based fund manager, said Aortech was moving towards becoming a pure IP (intellectual property) company, having transferred its US manufacturing facility to St Jude Medical. The company is temporarily retaining a small-batch capability, and manufacturing contract discussions are under way with a "mid-sized US polymer and medical device component manufacturer" .
Mr Brown said AorTech's revenue would now come from manufacturing share together with licence fees, and IP would be protected.
Several licences signed in prior years were now maturing, and "the potential income forecast by the licensees could result in significant royalties in future years for the group".
Mr Brown said: "Although the returns on the loan notes were attractive, the capital … enabled AorTech to continue trading and allowed us to reach a negotiated settlement in our dispute with St Jude. Without the loan note monies, AorTech would have undoubtedly failed."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article