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Mainz Biomed, Ganzimmun Diagnostics Partner to Commercialize Colorectal Cancer Test

NEW YORK – German molecular diagnostics company Mainz Biomed said on Tuesday that it has partnered with Ganzimmun Diagnostics, one of Germany's largest stool analysis labs, to commercialize its colorectal cancer detection test ColoAlert.

Under the agreement, Mainz Biomed will co-brand ColoAlert with Ganzimmun and sell its customized PCR assay kits to the lab on an on-demand basis. The deal expands ColoAlert's coverage especially in Mainz, Wiesbaden, and Frankfurt, Mainz Biomed said.

Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

According to Mainz Biomed, ColoAlert detects colorectal cancer with a sensitivity and specificity nearly as high as for colonoscopy. The test combines the fecal immunochemistry test with an analysis of cell DNA from stool for specific tumor markers and is designed to detect tumor DNA and colorectal cancer at the earliest stages.

"This is an important milestone for the company as we embark on executing a differentiated business model for ColoAlert from other at-home testing providers," Mainz Biomed CEO Guido Baechler said in a statement. "As we launch ColoAlert across Europe, we are steadfast in executing our strategy to establish commercial partnerships with leading third-party laboratories to provide customers with the most efficient and reliable test results."

In November, the company announced that its shares had started trading on the Nasdaq Capital Market under the ticker symbol MYNZ, following an initial public offering of 2 million ordinary shares that raised $10 million in gross proceeds.

In a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission before the IPO, the company said it intended to use the proceeds to further develop ColoAlert, as well as two other diagnostics called PancAlert, an early-stage pancreatic cancer screening test based on RT-PCR multiplex detection of genetic biomarkers in stool samples, and GenoStick, a platform being developed to detect pathogens molecularly.

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