Third Wave Delivers 200,000 HapMap SNP Assays to RIKEN
Third Wave Technologies has delivered 200,000 Invader SNP assays to the Japanese Institute for Physical and Chemical Research, also known as RIKEN, for use in the international HapMap project and other large-scale genotyping projects, the company said this week.
Third Wave said it began delivering the assays in early 2003, and would continue to provide RIKEN with SNP assays for its ongoing work on the HapMap initiative. Yusuke Nakamura, group director of the Research Group for Personalized Medicine at RIKEN, is responsible for completing 25 percent of the HapMap project.
The company is also providing RIKEN with Invader assays for other genotyping projects, such as the BioBank Japan project, which plans to genotype around 300,000 Japanese individuals over the next five years.
CombiMatrix Takes $1.25M Milestone in Toppan Microarray-Development Deal
CombiMatrix has received a $1.25 million milestone payment from Toppan as part of a development agreement the companies penned during the spring, the firms said this week.
The companies are co-developing a microarray product suite based on CombiMatrix’s electrochemical detection technology. When the technology is commercialized, Toppan will manufacture microarrays for CombiMatrix or its partners and will share revenues and royalties from sales of the products.
CombiMatrix, a subsidiary of Acacia Research, received an initial $1 million upfront payment from Toppan when the alliance was formed in May.
Applied DNA Sciences, Sense Holdings May Develop Technology to Thwart Identity Theft
Applied DNA Sciences and Sense Holdings may soon begin co-developing and co-commercializing tools for corporations, governments, and commercial clients that seek to eliminate identity theft, the firms said this week.
The deal, outlined in a memo of understanding “for strategic co-development and marketing” will comprise the Sense biometric and smartcard technologies with Applied DNA Sciences’ embedded DNA biotechnology products.
Specifically, the partnership will target “security applications, access control, time and attendance and the elimination of identity theft using card-based applications with a biometric layer,” the companies said.
According to the US Federal Trade Commission, there were 9.9 million cases of identity theft in the United States last year, which cost consumers $5 billion.
Bruker Daltonics Inks Biomarker Discovery Deal with SurroMed
Bruker Daltonics, a unit of Bruker BioSciences, will use its microTOF ESI-TOF mass spectrometers in SurroMed’s biomarker-discovery laboratory, the companies said last week.
The deal also calls for the companies to co-develop software and sample-fractionation products. Additional terms were not disclosed.
“In conjunction with SurroMed’s … MassView software, [Bruker’s mass spectrometry] instruments will allow us to increase substantially the number of proteins, peptides, and metabolites that we are able to identify and quantify from our samples,” Christopher Becker, SurroMed’s director of chemistry, said in a statement.
Genedata Extends Software License with U. of Minnesota
Genedata has extended a collaboration involving a license for its Expressionist gene-expression analysis software with the Supercomputing Institute for Digital Simulation and Advanced Computation of the University of Minnesota, the company said this week.
Scientists at the institute are using the enterprise software system to identify genes involved in allergen sensitivity in asthma, autoimmune diseases, lung rejection, multiple sclerosis, and reproductive and vegetative development in plants.
Genedata did not disclose any terms of the current agreement with the University of Minnesota, or how it expands on the previous agreement.
Tm Bioscience pockets $ca25M R&D Project with $CA7.3M in Gov’t Funds
Technology Partnerships Canada, an arm of the Canadian government, has awarded Tm Bioscience $CA7.3 million to help it develop certain genetic tests.
The project entails the construction of a pilot manufacturing facility, and the development of five genetic tests by 2006.
Additionally, Tm, which is headquartered in Toronto, will pay TPC a royalty on revenue from the products, which must be approved by the government, and will issue it $CA2.5 million in five-year common share purchase warrants on Dec. 31, 2005, also subject to regulatory approval.