Company Announcements

NanoString Technologies secured in January an exclusive option from Massachusetts General Hospital to license intellectual property related to a novel approach for multiplex protein analysis using its nCounter system.

Agilent Technologies entered into a comarketing agreement in January with Picometrics Technologies to provide combined solutions for capillary electrophoresis (CE), laser-induced fluorescence (LIF) detection and MS, including the only available online CE-LIF-MS solution.

Agilent Technologies is collaborating with Cell Line Genetics, which will develop high-throughput, genomic characterization workflows to confirm and monitor the integrity of cell lines based on Agilent’s custom, targeted CGH+SNP microarrays and SureFISH technology.

In January, Affymetrix received FDA 510(k) clearance for its CytoScan Dx Assay for the postnatal detection of DNA CNVs.

Bruker opened a Preclinical Imaging Center of Excellence for the Americas at its headquarters in Billerica, Massachusetts, in January.

Xstrahl Life Sciences announced in February that it will exclusively distribute SEDECAL’s Argus range of molecular imaging systems in North America.

Fourth quarter 2013 sales for Sequenom Bioscience slipped 1.3% to $12.4 million (see page 12). System sales grew 11.8% to make up 40% of segment revenue. Consumables and Maintenance services revenue fell 8.7% and 11.3% to represent 45% and 10%, respectively. Contract research services revenue rose 0.7%. Full-year 2013 Bioscience sales fell 0.9% to $42.9 million. System sales grew 3.5% to account for 34% of segment revenue. Consumables and Maintenance services revenues declined 3.6% and 2.6% to represent 49% and 12%, respectively. Revenue from contract research services rose 2.8% to make up 5%. The company submitted its IMPACT Dx system, based on the MassARRAY system, to the FDA for 510(k) approval.

Product Introductions

Affymetrix and the UK’s University of Bristol designed a wheat genotyping array for the sustainability of wheat production. A subset of markers was transferred onto Axiom 384HT–format arrays to create multiple focused wheat array designs for commercial use.

ProteinSimple launched in January the Sally Sue and Peggy Sue high-throughput Simple Western instruments, which deliver greater sensitivity than the first-generation Simple Western instruments and require less sample.

Syngene introduced the G:BOX Chemi XRQ for chemiluminescence, fluorescence and colorimetric imaging.

In February, NanoString Technologies released the nCounter Elements General Purpose Reagents, which enable clinical labs to independently develop assays for gene expression, CNV or gene fusions for up to 216 custom targets and translate those assays into laboratory-developed tests.