PARIS - Reporting a 60 percent jump in revenues for the first half of the company's 1999-2000 financial year, Chemunex S.A. CEO Louis Foissac said progress had been made toward regulatory acceptance of its ChemScan microbial analyzer in the pharmaceutical industry.

"A drug master file was lodged with the FDA in November 1999, which has now been accepted as a reference for manufacturers seeking regulatory approval for the routine use of ChemScan in their process control operations," he said.

ChemScan remains the flagship product of Chemunex, which is based in the Paris suburb of Ivry-sur-Seine and produces microbiological testing instruments and reagents for a number of industries. But Foissac said its recently launched D-Count analyzer was already selling well to the cosmetics and food processing industries in Europe. The French company L'Orial had taken the lead in validating the equipment and was installing it at plants around the world. He expected 15 to 20 D-Count analyzers to be sold during the current financial year and that annual sales would reach 50 within two years.

Chemunex's revenues in the six months to Dec. 31 totaled FFr25 million (US$3.9 million), up from FFr15.6 million in the first half of 1998-99. With production and distribution costs rising less than commensurately, by 54.3 percent and 33.7 percent, respectively, Chemunex reduced its net loss to FFr15.4 million in the first half of this year from FFr18.7 million in the first six months of 1998-99. The company's cash and equivalents totaled FFr50.3 million as of Dec. 31.

Chemunex derived 65 percent of its revenues from the pharmaceutical industry in the first half of 1999-2000 and 20 percent from the food industry, while sales to the cosmetics and water industries were just beginning to take off, said Foissac. Within two or three years, however, he said the cosmetics and water industries would each be generating 15 percent to 20 percent of its revenues, with the pharmaceutical industry's share down to 50 percent and food processing's to 10 percent to 20 percent. In geographical terms, Europe accounts for half its sales at present, the U.S. for 35 percent and Japan for 15 percent, but in two to three years Foissac expects the U.S. to be on a par with Europe.

Foissac also forecast that Chemunex would attain break-even status in fiscal year 2001-02. Research and development spending had leveled off (at around FFr27 million a year), while sales would be 50 percent up this year and rise by at least 40 percent in the next two financial years, he said.

In the longer term, Foissac also sees potential new sources of revenue in sectors where Chemunex had not planned to market its products. One of those is semiconductors, where extreme water purity is required and two companies, IBM and Texas Instruments, recently purchased ChemScan analyzers.