A Biotech firm which specialises in needle-free drug delivery has won a top award.

Glide Pharma based at Milton Park, near Didcot, was voted the best business at the 2007 Medical Futures Innovation Awards - widely recognised as Oscars of the healthcare industry.

The company has developed a needle-free drug delivery system that injects medicines in solid form into the skin, eliminating injuries and phobia of needles.

Founder and chief executive Dr Charles Potter said: "We are about to advance the first in a pipeline of our own brand products into clinics and we are also in negotiations with major pharmaceutical partners to co-develop the Glide Solid Dose Injector with their proprietary drugs and vaccines.

"There is strong interest in new delivery systems for both vaccines and biologics that are self-injected at home, such as insulin and human growth hormone."

Glide Pharma was also the winner of the Best Business Proposition Award in the Anaesthesia & Critical Care category at the ceremony attended by more than 500 people.

Dr Potter added that the firm was now looking to secure funding of about £2m from pharmaceutical partners.

Baroness Susan Greenfield, Professor of Pharmacology at Oxford University, who was a judge at the awards, said: "The awards make me proud to say the next generation of people and products that will keep us as a world-beating country in this sector are alive and kicking."