Chalfont St. Giles, England and Menlo Park, CA 6/30/09; Cambridgeshire, UK 6/25/09—GE Healthcare has entered into an exclusive license and alliance agreement with biopharmaceutical firm Geron to develop and commercialize cellular assay products derived from human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) for use in drug discovery, development and toxicity screening. GE has licensed Geron’s intellectual property for the growth and differentiation of hESCs and sublicensed Geron’s right to hESC patents held by the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation. GE will fund the companies’ R&D and will be responsible for manufacturing, as well as sales and distribution of the products. GE will receive rights to the drug discovery technologies and Geron will receive rights for cell therapy applications. “Combining GE Healthcare’s reach into the drug discovery and research markets, as well our expertise in cell manufacturing, with Geron’s expertise and IP in hESCs, means that together, we will be able to accelerate the development of hESC-derived products for drug discovery and development,” stated Konstantin Fiedler, general manager of Cell Technologies for GE Healthcare. The companies will use stem cells derived from hESC lines listed on the NIH Human Pluripotent Stem Cell Registry. The first products are expected to become available in early 2010. In other GE Healthcare news, Quotient Bioresearch has purchased Amersham Radiolabeling Services in Cardiff, Wales, the radiochemical custom synthesis operations of GE Healthcare. Global sales are now being transferred, with tritium and carbon-14 radiolabeling services to be transferred at the end of the year and in March 2010, respectively. (See page 1.)