Our history

From its early days of lateral flow device development over 10 years ago, Forsite has grown to become a trusted manufacturing partner for international governments and businesses. 

The seed which would become Forsite began in the mid 1990s when scientists at the then UK Government’s Central Science Laboratory (now known as the Food and Environment Research Agency) developed lateral flow tests for in-field identification of viruses.  Since then, a programme of expansion and diversification has taken place to achieve the current status of Forsite Diagnostics as a market leader in lateral flow device contract manufacture.

With investment from Safeguard Biosystems, Forsite became a private company and we dramatically expanded our facilities to become one of the best-equipped LFD manufacturing sites in Europe.  Since then Forsite has focused on providing LFD manufacturing services to a growing customer base. Our customers typically require one or more of the following: contract manufacture of a test they have developed; OEM of tests developed by Forsite; conversion of an ELISA assay to LFD; part processing of LFDs; or help to overcome their own production capacity issues.

We continue to supply tests to the UK statutory plant health services, and to similar services in many European countries.  Our credibility in the market is demonstrated by our impressive customer list which includes global industry players from the medical, food and veterinary sectors. We know our customers face demanding and dynamic market places, and we have demonstrated consistently that we can meet requirements in these environments.

Our development journey continues, as does the exciting advance in lateral flow technology. From the research projects in which we take part we capture new technologies to add value to our customers.   We are strongly confident of the long term growth of LFDs and wholly dedicated to providing first-class manufacturing services to our customers.