Genomatix Software and DNA service provider Eurofins MWG Operon have joined forces to offer genome resequencing and analysis services.
Under the terms of the exclusive partnership, Eurofins will perform the wet-lab work and Genomatix will do the sequence analyses, Klaus May, chief business officer of Genomatix, told BioInform via e-mail.
Customers can choose to order the service through either firm, he said. "We closely work together through all stages of a project, from pre-quote status, through the quotation (coming from one company, unless the customer wants differently), strategy development, and to the final results."
The joint offering builds on previous collaborations between the firms. "We did some projects together and the good experiences brought us to the conclusion to officially launch such a partnership," May said.
Under the agreement, the companies will offer next-gen sequencing, read mapping, analysis of ChIP-seq and digital gene expression data, and annotation services.
Eurofins MWG Operon, the product of the merger between MWG Biotech, Operon Biotechnologies, and Medigenomix, provides DNA sequencing and oligonucleotide synthesis services. The company, which has headquarters in Ebersberg, Germany, and Huntsville, Ala., provides next-generation sequencing services on the 454 GS FLX and Illumina Genome Analyzer platforms.
Genomatix, headquartered in Munich, Germany, offers a range of bioinformatics tools, including its Genomatix Genome Analyzer and Genomatix Mining Station for next-generation sequence analysis.
May said that under the partnership, Genomatix will use the Genomatix Genome Analyzer and Genomatix Mining Station for its analysis, as well as prototype software and other tools that are still in development.
"Working on cutting-edge projects helps us to identify new needs and requirements," he said. "The new developments will ultimately end up in the systems delivered to our customers."
The partnership is in line with a number of alliances that have recently been forged between sequencing service providers and bioinformatics firms. For example, CLC Bio announced last month that EdgeBio is using its software to analyze genomic data as part of its newly launched sequencing service business. CLC has also signed an agreement with Swiss sequencing shop Microsynth to provide a license for its CLC Genomics Workbench software for all of Microsynth's high-throughput sequencing service customers.
In addition, DNAStar and Scarab Genomics announced in April that they were working together to provide a sequencing services business that will include everything from library preparation to assembly, analysis, annotation, and visualization of end results (BI 4/29/10).
And last December, Ambry Genetics announced that it was partnering with SoftGenetics to provide bioinformatics analysis for second-generation sequencing projects (BioInform 12/4/2009).