Dolly firm faces the chop

The axe looks set to fall on Scottish biotechnology company PPL Therapeutics now that the company put itself up for sale, having failed to convince investors of a rescue plan.

Yesterday CEO Geoff Cook stepped down with immediate effect, and KPMG has been called in to oversee a sale of the firm and its assets. If a buyer cannot be found, the business will be liquidated.

PPL came to the world's attention with the cloning of Dolly the sheep - the first time that a mammal had been cloned from an adult cell - and had hoped to carve out a niche applying transgenic technologies to the production of biological drugs.

This dream came to an end in July, when PPL effectively pulled out of its transgenics business and announced that it would continue to operate as a stripped down entity focusing on the development of fibrin I as a surgical sealant.

Analysts said that PPL had suffered by focusing on a broad range of different technologies - stretching from transgenic production to xenotransplantation and stem cell research - rather than selecting a front-runner on which to concentrate. Any potential buyer is likely to be interested in PPL's cash reserves of around £11.4 million as much as its technology, they suggested.