Company Announcements

In December 2016, the University of California (UC) filed suit against Genia Technologies, its cofounder Roger Jinteh Arrigo Chen and unlisted defendants in US District Court. The complaints seek correction of inventorship, declaration of patent ownership, breach of contract, breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, conversion, and constructive trust.  The suit alleges that Mr. Chen, who worked on nanopore technology at UC Santa Cruz, violated UC’s Oath of Allegiance, Patent Policy and Patent Acknowledgement. UC filed patent applications for the technology that Mr. Chen worked on, identifying him as an inventor. UC alleges that Mr. Chen evaded or challenged UC’s request to fulfill his obligations under the Oath, including declarations necessary for completing the patent applications. UC also alleges that the patents held by Genia are based upon its technology.

In April, HTG Molecular Diagnostics transferred its listing from the NASDAQ Global Market to the NASDAQ Capital Market in order to meet listing requirements.

HTG Molecular Diagnostics announced in April a research agreement with Centre Léon Bérard utilizing the HTG EdgeSeq Oncology Biomarker Panel to retrospectively characterize immunologic profiles from advanced malignant tumor samples collected in the ProfiLER Study.

HTG Molecular Diagnostics signed a master services agreement with Daiichi Sankyo in May for work in HTG’s VERI/O lab. The initial project includes the development of a custom assay for the detection of nearly 3,000 mRNA targets.

In April, Thermo Fisher Scientific named the Institute of Medical Genetics and Pathology at University Hospital Basel, Switzerland as the first partner in its Next Generation Sequencing Companion Dx Center of Excellence Program.

In May, Thermo Fisher Scientific and Agios Pharmaceuticals entered into an agreement to develop and commercialize an NGS oncology companion diagnostic for ivosidenib, which is currently in a Phase 3 trial for treatment of patients with advanced IDH1m positive cholangiocarcinoma. Upon validation, Thermo Fisher will submit a supplemental premarket approval application to expand clinical claims for its multi-therapy NGS test that is currently awaiting FDA approval. Thermo Fisher retains the right to commercialize the test globally and will lead all regulatory filings.

Congenica and Edico Genome partnered in April to create an all-in-one genome data analysis solution for clinical labs and hospitals for diagnostics of inherited diseases.

Edico Genome announced in June that it raised $22 million in a Series B financing round. Dell Technologies Capital led the round.

Edico Genome announced in May that Illumina has added the DRAGEN to its BaseSpace Sequence Hub.

In April, Cogenica completed a Series B funding round. Investors included BGI Genomics and China-based Healthlink Capital. Healthlink’s clinical diagnostic lab also signed a contract to use Cogenica’s Sapientia software.

In May, QIAGEN formed MAQGEN, a joint venture with Chinese IVD firm Maccura Biotechnology for local adaptation, development and commercialization of QIAGEN’s GeneReader NGS System.

BGI announced in May that it plans to open a West Coast Global Innovation Center co-located in Seattle, Washington, and San Jose, California.

In May, DNAnexus announced its selection as a partner for AstraZeneca’s Centre for Genomics Research, which will analyze over two million genomes in the next 10 years by building a bespoke database of genomic sequences.

In May, Fabric Genomics partnered with data management company ITTM (Information Technology for Translational Medicine) to provide secure genome data hosting capabilities for EU customers.

Nabsys, which is developing the HD-Mapping optical mapping platform, announced its launch of a beta program in select labs early next year.

In May, Integrated DNA Technologies (IDT) announced a partnership with Illumina for NGS library preparation multiplexing and target enrichment. The companies will develop a portfolio of indexed adaptors to be manufactured by IDT, as well as comarket a complete workflow for exome capture. The index adaptors will extend the number of unique dual indexes from 8 to 24, with a 96 kit planned for introduction in the fourth quarter. The optimized index codes are currently available through IDT for incorporation into custom third-party NGS library preparation adapter sets.

ATCC and One Codex announced in May a partnership to provide sequencing controls and references materials for microbiome research. ATCC’s Microbome Research Solutions includes nucleic acid and whole-cell standards, which can be utilized in 16S and whole-genome sequencing. Customers can upload NGS data to the One Codex platform and receive a scorecard analysis of their ATCC Microbiome Standards.

Product Introductions

Thermo Fisher Scientific launched in March the Ion Torrent Oncomine Knowledgebase Reporter via Thermo Fisher Connect. The tool allows researchers to link sample-specific variants to labels, guidelines and global clinical trials.

Thermo Fisher Scientific launched in May the Ion AmpliSeq On-Demand targeted sequencing panels for inherited disease research, which provide easy and practical design customization capabilities to lower upfront costs regardless of project size.

FlowJo released in March SeqGeq, a desktop application for analyzing single-cell omics data featuring reduced processing time. It accepts many data types, including scRNA-seq, RNA-Seq or microarray data.

Illumina announced in April that it will launch in the fourth quarter an accessory device and consumables for its NovaSeq system enabling customers to address each lane of the flow cell independently, allowing easier loading of different library pools, applications and samples.

Oxford Gene Technologies launched in April expanded content for its SureSeq myPanel NGS Custom Cancer Panel. The Panel now covers 70 genes.

QIAGEN introduced in May the CLC Genomics Cloud Engine, optimized for near-automatic rapid deployment and runs on a customer-owned virtual private cloud infrastructure.

In May, Lab7 Systems released the Lab7 High-Performance Genomic Cloud powered by IBM, a complete solution for the management and analysis of genomic-scale data workloads and lab operations. It features the Enterprise Science Platform, calling it the industry’s only end-to-end solution for integrating web lab and computational operations.

New England Biolabs launched in May the strand-specific NEBNext Ultra II Directional RNA Library Prep Kit and the nondirectional NEBNext Ultra II RNA Library Prep Kit, both designed for Illumina sequencers. The kits are compatible with poly(A) mRNA isolation and rRNA depletion, and libraries can be constructed from an input range of 5 ng to 1 µg of total RNA.

Sales/Orders of Note

In April, precision medicine firm Personalis ordered 10 Illumina NovaSeq 6000 systems, with 2 instruments already delivered.

DNAnexus announced in May that the Rady Children’s Institute for Genomic Medicine adopted its DNAnexus Platform.