Pharmaceutical company Purogenix has gone into adminstration with the lost of more than 40 staff - despite receiving £4.8 million from regional growth funds.

The company, based on the Discovery Park in Sandwich, manufactured the antibiotic amoxicillin and had a 129,000 sq ft facility on the site.

It employed 45 staff - 41 of which have been made redundant.

A skeleton staff of four have been kept in place to help the administration team interested in purchasing either the business or its assets.

Formed in 2012 it received £4.8m - one of the highest amounts paid out by the Expansion East Kent scheme - to establish its base with hopes it would create hundreds of jobs.

It remains unclear if any of the money will be returned to the public purse.

Steve Absolom and Rob Croxen from KPMG’s restructuring practice have been appointed joint administrators to Purogenix Limited and Purogenix Holdings Ltd.

Mr Absolom said: "Whilst the joint administrators are unable to comment on the specific positions of individual creditors of the company, we understand that regional growth funding was provided to the company.

"Having just been appointed, the administrators' immediate focus is on supporting the employees who have lost their jobs and trying to maximise recoveries from the company’s business and assets for the benefit of creditors. Until this phase is complete, the outcome for creditors remains uncertain.

"It is very disappointing the company has had to make these redundancies.

"Purogenix Ltd is a relatively young business which had invested heavily in their facilities and sadly ran out of cash before fully establishing itself.

"The business ceased trading at the end of 2017 and has been looking for investors to provide the vital liquidity required to resume trading operations since then. However, it has been unable to secure the necessary funding so the company is now in administration.

“This is a very interesting and innovative business - manufacturing amoxicillin using cost-efficient and environmentally friendly technology. The administration team would be very interested in hearing from anyone who may be interested in this business, or its assets and facility in Kent.”