NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – EMD Millipore today announced a clinical research, licensing, and joint development deal with Japan's Sysmex aimed at creating a flow cytometry platform for blood disorders.
The companies will use EMD Millipore's flow cytometry technology as a platform to accelerate the development of new diagnostic tools. If successful, they will then develop the platform for commercialization in the hematology space, EMD Millipore, division of Germany's Merck KGaA, said.
Sysmex is conducting a clinical study to evaluate EMD Millipore's Amnis imaging flow cytometry technology for hematologic disorders, such as leukemia. Upon completion of the study, EMD Millipore and Sysmex plan to combine the Amnis technology with Sysmex's technologies to develop new imaging flow cytometry technology "that will generate image data of molecular (protein) expression status, as well as the identification of abnormal cells in the blood."
EMD Millipore did not elaborate on which Sysmex technologies would be used in the alliance.
The initial step of the collaboration is a clinical trial of the Amnis technology to detect and characterize leukemic conditions and other hematologic disorders in patient blood samples. EMD Millipore said that an earlier joint feasibility study "showed very encouraging results."
Financial and other terms of the deal were not disclosed.