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In Brief This Week: Roche, Cepheid; Anagnostics, Ramcon; InCellDx, Labco; Genome Designs; Prometheus

NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – Roche has initiated an arbitration hearing against Cepheid in response to Cepheid's decision to terminate its real-time PCR license with Roche, according to GenomeWeb Daily News sister publication PCR Insider. Cepheid had said in October that it was terminating the remainder of its PCR license with Roche "after determining that any patents remaining under the license are not pertinent to Cepheid's future business plans."

For more, see this week's issue of PCR Insider.


Anagnostics said this week that Ramcon A/S will exclusively sell the firm's hybcell drug screening tests and pharmacogenetics tests in Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland and Iceland.


IncellDx said this week that European clinical lab network Labco will now offer its HPV OncoTect assay throughout its entire network in Europe. Previously, Labco offered the test, which quantifies the overexpression of E6/E7 mRNA, on a limited basis.


Genome Designs, a Walnut Creek, Calif.-based sequencing informatics startup, said this week that it has received seed funding from undisclosed private investors and launched its operations. The firm didn't say how much in funding it received. It was founded by former employees of Argonne National Lab, NCBI, Integrated Genomics, and Ariadne. Genome Designs' CEO, Natalia Alexandrova, formerly served as marketing director at Ariadne.


Prometheus Laboratories has signed a research and collaboration agreement with an unnamed pharmaceutical firm to develop a pharmacogenomics assay for the partner's oncology pipeline. Prometheus will receive an upfront payment for development of the first assay, with additional payments for additional assays, as well as R&D support and testing fees.


In Brief This Week is a Friday column containing news items that our readers may have missed during the week.

The Scan

Study Examines Insights Gained by Adjunct Trio RNA Sequencing in Complex Pediatric Disease Cases

Researchers in AJHG explore the diagnostic utility of adding parent-child RNA-seq to genome sequencing in dozens of families with complex, undiagnosed genetic disease.

Clinical Genomic Lab Survey Looks at Workforce Needs

Investigators use a survey approach in Genetics in Medicine Open to assess technologist applications, retention, and workforce gaps at molecular genetics and clinical cytogenetics labs in the US.

Study Considers Gene Regulatory Features Available by Sequence-Based Modeling

Investigators in Genome Biology set sequence-based models against observational and perturbation assay data, finding distal enhancer models lag behind promoter predictions.

Genetic Testing Approach Explores Origins of Blastocyst Aneuploidy

Investigators in AJHG distinguish between aneuploidy events related to meiotic missegregation in haploid cells and those involving post-zygotic mitotic errors and mosaicism.