A STUDENT on work placement has found a solution to a production problem which could potentially save one of the world's biggest drug companies millions of pounds.

Chemists at GlaxoSmithKline in Barnard Castle, County Durham, had been unable to identify an impurity in one of its antibiotics.

The problem was holding up production at the company, but no one had been able to crack it.

So when Andy Cartwright, 22, arrived on placement from Sunderland University he was handed the task to study.

After seven months, he amazed bosses at the firm by announcing he had not only identified the impurity, but also how it came into the process.

The detection of impurities in antibiotics was holding up a new method of production, which would be more cost- effective and less wasteful.

The American Food and Drug Administration (FDA) would not accept the process until the problem had been solved.

But after Andy's breakthrough, the FDA has given the go-ahead and Glaxo is free to implement its plans.

Andy's reward has been a scholarship from Glaxo which will see him through a three-year PhD in mass spectrometry.

His work for the firm, which counted as 20 per cent of his final mark, helped earn him a 2:1 degree.

Andy, of Lytham St Anne's, Lancashire, said: "It will have saved them quite a lot, but it is not just a money thing.

"It has been good for them and I must admit that it looks good on my CV.

"I don't suppose many students can say they have solved a problem for one of the largest pharmaceutical companies."

A spokeswoman for GlaxoSmithKline said: "We are very grateful to Andy for the excellent work he did for us."