Medical imaging software company Medicsight aims to raise £30m when it floats on the London Stock Exchange later this month, in a bid to expand into a market worth between £150m and £200m. Britain's Medicsight, a company which designs software to help detect cancer, intends to raise £30m ($59.3m) and list on the London Stock Exchange's Alternative Investment Market (AIM).

The firm, which expects to have a market size of between £150m and £200m when it floats later this month, makes image analysis software that helps spot diseases like lung and colon cancer.

It is targeting deals with firms that make Computed Tomography (CT) scanners which spot lung and colon cancer because these are the most common types of cancer.

Floating on AIM would significantly enhance the company's growth strategy over the next three years: "It will help raise our profile with existing and potential partners," says Medicsight's CEO, David Sumner.

It expects to sign a global deal with a large original equipment manufacturer this year. The firm already has five global distribution deals with smaller manufacturers.

Tim Paterson-Brown, CEO of MGT Capital Investments and Chairman of Medicsight plc, adds, "We are very pleased to join AIM and the London Stock Exchange. The listing of Medicsight shares will add significant value to MGT shareholders and provide Medicsight with working capital to expand sales and execute on its growth strategy."

Medicsight's CAD systems can analyse the thousands of images generated by Multi-Detector CT Scanners and highlight to the interpreting radiologist specific areas which may require further investigation - these areas may be an indication of cancer or a lesion which could become cancerous.

Lung cancer is the most common and deadliest of cancers with 1.3 million new cases diagnosed worldwide each year, according to the World Health Organisation. Colon cancer, the second most common cancer, causes 655,000 deaths each year but if detected early enough 90 per cent of cases can be cured.

Studies have shown that Medicsight's CAD software can increase the chance of spotting cancer to 90 per cent, whereas without a CAD system the chances of success may be reduced to anywhere in the range of 30 to 80 per cent.

The firm wants to use the proceeds of the float to develop its own products and for bolt-on acquisitions. It hopes to buy small software projects at the academic stage and take them to commercial development.

The firm has regulatory approval for its software in Europe and Canada, expects Australian approval in the next three months and United States and Japanese approval in 2008.

In conjunction with the announcement of its intent to list on the AIM market, Medicsight plc has launched an updated corporate website, www.medicsight.com. The new site contains information on the Medicsight plc, investor relations resources and is independent from the website of MGT Capital Investments, www.mgtci.com.