Print“With hundreds of compounds currently in clinical trials for oncology indications alone, Life sees a strong market opportunity for expansion in the companion diagnostics space.”
Life Technologies and Bristol-Myers Squibb have entered into an agreement covering current and future companion diagnostics projects between the two companies. It is their second collaboration and represents another step in Life Technologies’ strategy to develop its diagnostics business through internal development, partnerships, and select acquisitions. The agreement covers an initial project for oncology and provides for a long-term partnership across a potentially broad range of instrument platforms and therapeutic areas. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed.
“The pharmaceutical industry is increasingly turning its focus to discovering and delivering targeted, personalized medications,” says Ronnie Andrews, president of medical sciences at Life Technologies in a statement. “As more and more targeted drugs come onto the market in the next decade, there will be a growing need for diagnostics that can help predict which patients will benefit from which drugs.”
There have been more than 25 deals that involve companion diagnostics so far this year. With hundreds of compounds currently in clinical trials for oncology indications alone, Life sees a strong market opportunity for expansion in the companion diagnostics space.
Life has been steadily beefing up its offerings in the space. In July it acquired the personal genetic testing company Navigenics that, in addition to its genetics platform and support services, owned an established CLIA-certified laboratory that Life will use to design and validate new diagnostics assays.
A week later, Life acquired Pinpoint Genomics and its early-stage non-small cell lung cancer test that can help doctors identify those early-stage patients at high risk for progression to late-disease. That acquisition gave it another CLIA-certified lab.
These technologies supplement Life’s already wide array of platforms that include its Ion Torrent line of DNA sequencers, all of which it can leverage to develop new diagnostics.
Life is one of many tools and technology providers that are jockeying to gain market share in the diagnostics arena, a sector that plays a critical role in personalizing therapies. The year has seen several high profile acquisitions, including Agilent’s $2.2 billion acquisition of Denmark-based Dako in May, Thermo Fisher Scientific’s $925 million acquisition of One Lambda in July, and most recently Illumina’s acquisition of the British diagnostics developer BlueGnome, which provides solutions for screening genetic abnormalities associated with developmental delay, cancer, and infertility.
As personalized medicine continues to evolve and advance, drug companies are increasingly turning to diagnostics company partners. Drugs that prove effective for a certain genetically defined subset of cancer patients, for instance, can be even more effectively marketed along with a diagnostic that reliably identifies the subset of patients for whom a drug will benefit most.
September 20, 2012
http://www.burrillreport.com/article-life_technologies_to_make_companion_diagnostics_for_bristol_myers_squibb_.html
