Personalized Medicine
Signal Genetics Acquires ChipDX, a Prognostic-Cancer-Test Company
Signal Genetics, a privately held predictive-genetic-testing company focused on oncology and headquartered in New York City, announced that it will acquire all assets of ChipDX LLC (New York City), a prognostic-cancer-test company, including patents for prognostic tests in lung, breast, and colon cancers. The announcement appeared on MarketWatch.com. As part of the transaction, Signal will acquire the BreastGeneDX, ColonGeneDX, and LungGeneDX tests, all of which are in...
Roche vs. Illumina: The Drama Intensifies
  Update: The New York Times' Dealbook blog posted this in-depth look at the loophole in Illumina's organizational documents that is making it possible for Roche to gain the advantage.   As we blogged about last week, Roche intends to buy Illumina Inc., an international company headquartered in San Diego that develops and manufactures array-based systems for DNA, RNA, and protein analysis. However, Illumina's Board of Directors appears to be uninterested in Roche’s offer and has...
Quest Gets FDA Greenlight for Stratify JCV
Quest Diagnostics, the well-known provider of diagnostic testing and services, today announced that FDA has granted a de novo classification petition to its Stratify JCV Antibody ELISA testing service. Quest says Stratify JCV is the first blood test to get the OK from FDA for the qualitative detection of antibodies to the polyomavirus JC virus (JCV), for stratifying risk for progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy (PML), an infrequent but serious brain infection. The infection can occur...
GE Healthcare Discusses Companion Diagnostics in Personalized Medicine
Pascale Witz, President and CEO, GE Healthcare, Medical Diagnostics discussed diagnostics as the future of personalized medicine at the 30th JP Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco, CA. During her presentation, Witz noted that diagnostics and pathology screening are core enablers of personalized medicine, and outlined how GE Healthcare partners with the pharmaceutical industry to support market entry of new therapies via providing complex technologies that can aid in the conduct of...
What the Future of Diagnostics Will Likely Hold
Brian Buntz, managing editor of MDDI, attended the "Diagnostics and Personalized Medicine" session at the OneMedForum San Francisco 2012 conference and submitted the following notes: We are entering the era of personalized medicine, according to the panelists at a session aptly titled “Diagnostics and Personalized Medicine” at the OneMedForum in San Francisco. The age of one-size-fits-all medicine can’t be sustained. And as progress is made in this area, in the not...
Qiagen Gains Approval in Japan for EGFR Companion Diagnostic, Rights to Cancer Biomarkers
Qiagen announced the regulatory approval of its therascreen EGFR Mutation Detection Kit RGQ in Japan. EGFR, the epidermal growth factor receptor, has been shown to play an important role in certain cancers and is the target of many new anticancer drugs. The approval is a milestone in Qiagen's Personalized Healthcare strategy, as Japan is one of the world's largest markets for companion diagnostic tests. In April 2011, Qiagen's therascreen KRAS Mutation Detection Kit was approved in Japan,...
Aeterna Zentaris, Ventana Medical Systems to Develop Companion Diagnostic
Aeterna Zentaris Inc. entered into a collaboration agreement with Ventana Medical Systems Inc., a member of the Roche Group, to develop a companion diagnostic for the immunohistochemical determination of luteinizing hormone-releasing hormone (LHRH) receptor expression, for the Company’s doxorubicin LHRH targeted conjugate compound, AEZS-108. In humans, LHRH receptors are expressed in a significant proportion of endometrial, ovarian, breast, bladder, prostate and pancreatic tumors. AEZS-...
Abbott, GSK Pump Up Companion Diagnostic Agreement
Abbott will expand its existing agreement with GlaxoSmithKline Biologicals SA (GSK) to include the development of an additional companion diagnostic test in support of GSK’s cancer immunotherapy research program. Companion diagnostic tests are designed to identify specific DNA sequences to help guide physicians in determining which patients are more or less likely to benefit from a particular therapy. The existing agreements between the two companies, announced in July 2009 and March 2010...
Dako Enters New Collaboration with Bristol-Myers Squibb
Dako has entered into a broad framework agreement with Bristol-Myers Squibb on the development of pharmacodiagnostic tests intended to identify patients more likely to benefit from treatment with investigational drug candidates under development by Bristol-Myers Squibb. The agreement builds on a collaboration begun in 2008. “It is a great pleasure for me to announce Dako’s new collaboration with Bristol-Myers Squibb. This alliance heralds the intentions of both companies to work...
GE Healthcare Presents on Importance of Molecular Diagnostics in Personalized Treatment
Ger Brophy, PhD, Head of New Product Development, GE Healthcare, Medical Diagnostics discussed diagnostics as the future of personalized medicine at the TEDMED 2011 Conference in San Diego, CA. During his talk, Brophy noted that while new drugs and targeted treatment have advanced the personalized medicine field considerably, realizing this paradigm depends on the development of powerful diagnostics – some of which are available today. “Today, we’re at a tipping point in...