NEW YORK (GenomeWeb) – Novigenix today announced it has acquired Colox, a blood-based molecular diagnostic test to detect colorectal cancer and pre-cancerous polyps.
Originally developed by Diagnoplex, the Colox test can detect colorectal cancer from a whole blood sample, looking at the gene expression signature of 29 genes in peripheral blood mononuclear cells. Novigenix plans to use a proprietary algorithm to interpret gene expression data and generate the Colox test report.
Colox has been approved for sale in Europe, and has been launched commercially in Switzerland as a service provided by Unilabs' network of clinical diagnostic laboratories.
"We are committed to making Colox available to physicians and patients across Switzerland, followed by expansion in other European countries," Novigenix Executive Chairman Brian Hashemi said in a statement. The firm said it would seek partnerships to make Colox available throughout Europe.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.