Company Announcements

Helicos BioSciences President Steven J. Lombardi resigned in February, and CEO Ronald A. Lowy was named president.

DNA sequencer developer Pacific Biosciences launched a partner program in February. Among the 11 initial partners are Agilent, Caliper Life Sciences, Fluidigm, NuGEN Technologies and RainDance Technologies.

Gyros AB signed an exclusive distribution agreement with SCRUM for Japan.

NABsys, a developer of solid-state sequencing technology, received a $7 million investment in February as part of a Series B equity round led by Stata Venture Partners.

Seahorse Bioscience closed a $5 million financing Series D round in February.

Transgenomics’ 2009 sales fell 8.3% to $22.0 million (see IBO 4/15/10). Net loss was $1.9 million compared to $495,000 in 2008. Instrument Related Business revenue fell 11.6% to $17.5 million. The company had an installed base of over 1,475 WAVE Systems as of December 31, 2009.

In March, Life Technologies announced early-stage results from its single molecule–sequencing technology. The technology eliminates the need for cloning or amplification and uses Qdot nanocrystals.

Life Technologies is collaborating with the Translational Genomics Research Institute and US Oncology to demonstrate whether genomic sequencing of cancer tissue can provide clues for treatment strategies.

In March, Biolin Scientific acquired Farfield, a supplier of dual polarization interferometry technology for bioscience research, for £1.3 million ($2 million) payable in convertible notes. For the fiscal year ended March 2009, Farfield generated sales of £1.6 million ($2.7 million) and EBITDA earnings of £0.2 million ($339,000).

Product Introductions

Gentel Biosciences launched the Gentel Proteomics Multi-System for multiplex immunoassays, lysate and antigen arrays, as well as Western Blot, ELISA and tissue imaging. It includes a scanner, laptop computer, software, and ApiX chromogenic reagents and slides.

Life Technologies introduced the Applied Biosystems 3500 Series Genetic Analyzer, a capillary electrophoresis–sequencing system designed for forensic laboratories.

Life Technologies, in partnership with Hitachi High-Technologies, launched the Applied Biosystems SOLiD PI System, which is designed to generate up to 50 Gb of mappable sequence data per run. It is anticipated to have a US list price of $230,000. Early-customer adoption is expected to begin in the second half of the year.

Agilent released the Agilent Fish Species Identification method. It uses the DNA Fish Species ID Ensemble with the 2100 Bioanalyzer and specialized RFLP (restriction fragment length polymorphism) Decoder Software. The PCR-RFLP method was developed by Campden BRI.