Painless injection company Powderject has signed a 24m agreement to lease part of its new vaccines factory to a US biotech company, writes Maggie Hartford.

Powderject, based at Oxford Science Park at Sandford, said it had negotiated a better deal after taking over the Evans Vaccines plant in Merseyside from Celltech earlier this month for 55m.

The factory will make FluMist, a nasal spray flu vaccine, for Aviron.

Powderject inherited a royalty-based deal, but has won a new contract, under which Aviron will make initial payments to Powderject totalling 10m, with further payments of 2.3m for five years. Powderject will also receive additional performance-based milestone payments of up to 2m over the period of the agreement.

In addition, Powderject will receive warrants to subscribe over the period of the agreement for 63,162 Aviron shares.

Powderject chief executive Dr Paul Drayson said: "This revised agreement represents an excellent start to our ownership of Evans Vaccines by offering Powderject secured revenues that are higher than under the previous agreement.

"This new relationship highlights the progress we are making in bringing more commercial focus to our newly acquired Evans Vaccines business."

Aviron has taken a 25-year lease on 45,000 sq ft of the factory, which it will convert to make its nasal spray. It will also take on Powderject staff who are working on development of the vaccine.