Intelligent Fingerprinting appoints Director of Quality to help drive Home Office Type Approval and US FDA Approval and Regulatory Affairs activities
- Dr Martin Payne joins from Philips Electronics, and brings over 20 years’ senior Quality Assurance and Regulatory Affairs experience to Intelligent Fingerprinting
Intelligent Fingerprinting, the Cambridge-based company developing the world’s first portable fingerprint-based drug screening system, has appointed Dr Martin Payne as Director of Quality to head up the company’s Quality Assurance and Regulatory Affairs activities.
Martin Payne brings over 20 years’ senior Quality Assurance and Regulatory Affairs experience to his role at Intelligent Fingerprinting. Martin’s appointment coincides with the company’s moving towards the commercialisation of its unique, non-invasive drug screening system. The system is designed with human factors in mind, being exceptionally easy-to-use and screening for multiple drugs of abuse in under 10 minutes by analysing chemicals in the tiny traces of sweat contained in a fingerprint.
Regulatory approvals are critical to facilitate access to key markets where drug screening is carried out, and – given the ground-breaking nature of Intelligent Fingerprinting’s technology – will inevitably be complex. With UK Government Home Office Type Approval, the company will be able to support criminal justice activities including road side screening for drug-driving, while US Food & Drug Administration (FDA) approval will enable the targeting of workplace and healthcare applications.
Commenting on his new role, Martin said: “At Intelligent Fingerprinting, it’s essential that we have the correct quality and regulatory processes in place across all aspects of our business, from initial R&D and manufacturing right through to deployment. I’m looking forward to supporting the company’s preparations for FDA and UK Government Home Office Type Approval, and making sure that we have all the right activities and processes in place to support not just our initial target market applications but also subsequent intended uses of our drug screening system.”
At Philips Electronics Martin spent six years as Director of Quality Assurance, Regulatory Affairs and Clinical & Medical Affairs for the company’s Home Clinical Monitoring operation. In this role he was focused particularly on the development of clinical monitoring activities for patients self-testing at home: experience that is particularly relevant for future Intelligent Fingerprinting applications such as the monitoring of drug use via home-based tests.
Dr Jerry Walker, Intelligent Fingerprinting’s CEO, added: “Quality informs everything we do at Intelligent Fingerprinting, so I’m delighted that we have been able to bring a senior Quality Assurance and Regulatory Affairs leader on board to help support us in achieving our Home Office Type Approval and FDA approval activities. Martin is an important addition to our management team as we move towards commercialisation.”
About Intelligent Fingerprinting
Intelligent Fingerprinting’s unique fingerprint-based portable Drug Screening System is set to revolutionise the way drug screening is carried out across a range of sectors. The distinctive Intelligent Fingerprinting technology, which works by analysing the sweat from a fingerprint sample, enables non-invasive, cost-effective screening for multiple drug groups in less than 10 minutes, currently amphetamines, cannabis, cocaine and opiates.
Intelligent Fingerprinting has attracted worldwide interest in its technology from a wide range of drug-screening markets including the criminal justice arena, drug rehabilitation centres, prisons and occupational health services. The technique has potential for many other uses including healthcare diagnostics and homeland security applications. The company’s ground-breaking technology detects drug use by analysing chemicals, known as metabolites, contained in the minute traces of sweat found in a fingerprint. (Metabolites are chemicals produced by the body as a result of normal metabolic processes.) The Intelligent Fingerprinting Drug Screening System looks for the presence of specific drugs or drug metabolites in the test subject’s fingerprint sweat sample and, if detected, identifies which drugs have been consumed.
Since 2012 Intelligent Fingerprinting has raised £11.23m in funding from a consortium of private UK and US-based investors, as well as government funding for pilot studies within the UK’s National Health Service and coroners’ services. Founded in 2007, Intelligent Fingerprinting is a spin-out company from the University of East Anglia (UEA). The company is based in Cambridge, England and currently employs 26 people.
