NewswireToday – /newswire/ – Basel, Switzerland, 06/29/2009 – Leading Japanese pharmaceutical company uses Genedata Expressionist for internal R & D.

Genedata, a leading provider of in silico solutions for pharmaceutical R&D and related life sciences, and Chugai Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd., a leading Japanese research-based pharmaceutical company, have signed a multi-year contract for the use of the Genedata Expressionist® system to streamline their internal R&D process.

“We are working with tens of thousands of GeneChip® data sets. In the past, we were limited to normalizing small batches at a time. With Expressionist we can normalize the entire data set in one go,” said Mr. Junichi Muroya, member of the bioinformatics team at Chugai Pharmaceutical. “This has greatly increased processing speed, facilitated sophisticated statistical analysis and overall improved the quality of our results significantly.”

As part of their work in oncology and chronic diseases, researchers at Chugai have used Expressionist to perform a one-step, enterprise-wide normalization on their entire microarray data pool. Expressionist was also used to standardize the workflow-based microarray quality control process and obtain fully comparable data for subsequent data analysis.

“We are excited to work with Chugai, one of the most innovative pharmaceutical companies in Japan,” said Dr. Othmar Pfannes, CEO of Genedata. “Our partnership with Chugai is another example of Genedata’s successful expansion in the Japanese market. It also demonstrates the positive impact of our cutting-edge software and services on R&D productivity and how this ultimately saves time and money for our partners.”

About Chugai

Chugai Pharmaceutical (chugai-pharm.co.jp), specialized in prescription pharmaceuticals and based in Tokyo, is one of Japan’s leading research-based pharmaceutical companies with strengths in biotechnology products. Since the start of the strategic alliance with Roche in October 2002, Chugai is actively involved in prescription pharmaceutical R&D activities in Japan and abroad as an important member of the Roche Group. Specifically, Chugai is working to develop innovative products with global applications, focusing on the oncology and chronic disease field. In Japan, Chugai’s research facilities in Gotemba and Kamakura are collaborating to develop new pharmaceuticals and Ukima is conducting research for technology development for industrial production. Overseas, Chugai Pharma USA and Chugai Pharma Europe are engaged in clinical development activities in the United States and Europe. The consolidated sales in 2008 of Chugai totalled 326.9 billion yen and the operating profit was 51.6 billion yen. Chugai is aiming at the consolidated sales of 460 billion yen and operating profit of 80 billion yen in 2012, as stated in new mid-term business plan “Sunrise 2012”.

About Genedata

Genedata (genedata.com) develops and globally markets sophisticated computational solutions for drug discovery and related research processes in the life sciences. Genedata’s solutions enable scientists to process, integrate, analyze, and manage large and complex experimental data sets generated by high throughput technologies. Solutions include Genedata Phylosopher® for target discovery and integrative biological data management, Genedata Screener® for automated high throughput screening and high content screening, and Genedata Expressionist® for biomarker discovery and personalized medicine. Founded in 1997, Genedata is privately held, with headquarters in Basel, Switzerland, and offices in Boston & San Francisco, USA, Konstanz & Munich, Germany and Tokyo, Japan.