Under the agreement, BioMerieux, of Marcy L'Etoile, France, has non-exclusive rights to Affymetrix's GeneChip technology, including future improvements, to develop and market in vitro diagnostics for breast cancer. The company also has the option to broaden this agreement to other cancers.
Under an agreement from late 2003, BioMerieux has had the right to use Affy's GeneChip technology to develop tests for virulence factors, bacterial strain typing, sepsis diagnosis, hepatitis C, as well as respiratory and central nervous system infectious panels.
The companies did not disclose financial terms of the new agreement.