QIAGEN Significantly Expands its Offering of Assay Panels for Next-generation Sequencing (NGS) Complemented by Ingenuity Analysis and Interpretation Capabilities

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Jun 07, 2013, 07:15 ET

GERMANTOWN, Maryland and HILDEN, Germany, June 7, 2013 /PRNewswire/ --

Expansion to about 20 validated gene panels will offer customers new opportunities for targeted clinical sequencing in a growing range of indications in cancer and other diseases
Driving adoption through ease of use, quality of results and compatibility with existing NGS workflows as well as with QIAGEN NGS platform now in development
Integration of Ingenuity Knowledge Base greatly enhances ease and depth of NGS data interpretation, seen as key bottleneck to NGS adoption in clinical research and diagnostics

QIAGEN N.V. (NASDAQ: QGEN; Frankfurt Prime Standard: QIA) today announced plans to significantly expand its existing portfolio of molecular assays used in next-generation sequencing (NGS) during 2013 as part of its expansion into this fast-growing market and ambitions to provide an ecosystem of products and services designed to drive greater use of this breakthrough technology in clinical research and diagnostics.

QIAGEN is exhibiting its NGS products at the European Society of Human Genetics Conference from June 8-11 in Paris.

The current portfolio of nine GeneRead™ DNAseq panels launched in late 2012 is being expanded to approximately 20 during the course of 2013. QIAGEN is leveraging its deep molecular content and assay portfolio to create these new gene panels for targeted NGS analysis based on the GeneGlobe portfolio of more than 60,000 annotated molecular assays. Initial customer demand has been very strong for these products, which are "universal" and are designed to be used on any NGS platform, and also to integrate seamlessly into the sample-to-result NGS workflow that includes the QIAGEN GeneReader platform targeted for placements to select customer groups in 2013.

Since sequencing of entire human genomes requires considerable resources and time, users of NGS technology in clinical research and diagnostics often prefer to perform targeted sequencing of clinically relevant genes based on focused gene panels of interest. This expanding portfolio of products addresses the urgent needs of customers to efficiently generate relevant NGS data by providing fast turnaround time, low DNA input requirements and quality control standards, all of which result in more cost-effective, accurate and reproducible results from each sequencing run.

QIAGEN's current offering includes eight focused and curated NGS gene panels for a range of cancers -

breast, colon, liver, lung, ovarian, prostate, gastric and blood - and each covering approximately 20 different genes of interest. QIAGEN also already offers a comprehensive cancer panel covering 124 different genes. The panels being launched will focus on various cancers as well as new disease areas, and QIAGEN intends to continuously expand this portfolio with new panel offerings.

In addition to the workflow benefits of these panels, QIAGEN is integrating access to the cloud-based Variant Analysis™ software acquired with Ingenuity Systems in early 2013 to its gene panels, enabling customers to rapidly translate raw sequencing data into actionable results. This biological interpretation solution enables customers to rapidly identify and prioritize genetic variants, accessing the most current and advanced interpretations of genomic data.

One of the early users of QIAGEN's GeneRead DNAseq gene panels is Prof. Dr. Reinhard Büttner, head of the Institute for Pathology at the University of Cologne, a leading European institution for NGS-based lung cancer testing that has been evaluating QIAGEN's gene panels for lung cancer and leukemia.

"We received high-quality reads during our sequencing runs with these gene panels and appreciated the fact that the primer sets were validated by QIAGEN. Also, easy sample preparation and quantification makes these products flexible and easy to integrate into existing workflows," Dr. Büttner said.

As part of its expansion into NGS, QIAGEN also recently launched a full range of sample and library preparation products for NGS. For example, NGS analysis often is limited by the small amount of sample available, a challenge that labs can overcome using the REPLI-g^® Single Cell Kit, which is designed to deliver unbiased amplification of genomic DNA from single cells. Among the early adopters of this technology is BGI (formerly Beijing Genome Institute), the world's largest genomics center, which provides sequencing and bioinformatics services for medical, agricultural and environmental applications.

"Our ambition is to offer an ecosystem - a complete portfolio of products and services - to make next-generation sequencing technology more effective, robust and scalable for adoption in clinical research and diagnostics," said Dr. Dietrich Hauffe, Senior Vice President, Life Sciences Business Area of QIAGEN. "Customers using NGS technologies know that high-quality pre-analytical solutions are critical for achieving outstanding sequencing results. Our focus in the early stages of serving the NGS marketplace is on delivering the most reliable, sensitive solutions available. We're very encouraged by the feedback of our early customers and will further expand our offering to address the requirements of laboratories in clinical research and healthcare."

QIAGEN's next-generation sequencing products are for research use only and should not be used in any diagnostic procedures.

About QIAGEN

QIAGEN N.V., a Netherlands holding company, is the leading global provider of Sample & Assay Technologies that are used to transform biological materials into valuable molecular information. Sample technologies are used to isolate and process DNA, RNA and proteins from biological samples such as blood or tissue. Assay technologies are then used to make these isolated biomolecules visible and ready for interpretation. QIAGEN markets more than 500 products around the world, selling both consumable kits and automation systems to customers through four customer classes: Molecular Diagnostics (human healthcare), Applied Testing (forensics, veterinary testing and food safety), Pharma (pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies) and Academia (life sciences research). As of March 31, 2013, QIAGEN employed approximately 4,000 people in more than 35 locations worldwide. Further information can be found at http://www.qiagen.com/.

Certain of the statements contained in this news release may be considered forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the U.S. Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the U.S. Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. To the extent that any of the statements contained herein relating to QIAGEN's products, markets, strategy or operating results, including without limitation its expected operating results, are forward-looking, such statements are based on current expectations and assumptions that involve a number of uncertainties and risks. Such uncertainties and risks include, but are not limited to, risks associated with management of growth and international operations (including the effects of currency fluctuations, regulatory processes and dependence on logistics), variability of operating results and allocations between customer classes, the commercial development of markets for our products inapplied testing, personalized healthcare, clinical research,proteomics, women's health/HPVtesting andnucleic acid-basedmolecular diagnostics; changing relationships with customers, suppliers and strategic partners; competition; rapid or unexpected changes in technologies; fluctuations in demand for QIAGEN's products (including fluctuations due to general economic conditions, the level and timing of customers' funding, budgets and other factors); our ability to obtain regulatory approval of our products; difficulties in successfully adapting QIAGEN's products to integrated solutions and producing such products; the ability of QIAGEN to identify and develop new products and to differentiate and protect our products from competitors' products; market acceptance of QIAGEN's new products, the consummation of acquisitions, and the integration of acquired technologies and businesses. For further information, please refer to the discussions in reports that QIAGEN has filed with, or furnished to, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).