Annual sales at Almac, the Craigavon-based pharmaceutical firm, topped £1bn for the first time in 2024.

Total revenues for the year ending 30 September were £1.027bn, a £69.5m (7%) increase from 2023.

Pre-tax profits rose by 27% to £119m, which is up from £93.8m in the previous year.

Almac’s main line of business is providing services, such as manufacturing and distribution, to major global pharmaceutical firms.

It also develops its own drugs, for example earlier this month it reached an agreement to licence a cancer treatment to a Taiwanese firm for further development and commercialisation.

The company continued to grow its workforce over the last year and now employs about 7,700 people across its global operations.

Alan Armstrong, Almac’s group chairman and chief executive, said: “Today’s results mark another successful year of growth for Almac.

“As a privately-owned and independent company, we re-invest all our profits back into the business, enabling us to innovate and expand to meet the growing needs of our global clients, working in partnership to advance human health.”

Those investments have included growing the company’s production and distribution facilities in the US and Singapore.

Almac has now joined a small number of Northern Ireland-based firms that boast an annual turnover of £1bn or more.

They include Graham construction and W&R Barnett, a commodities and manufacturing group.