NEW YORK – Qiagen announced Wednesday that the company and AstraZeneca have expanded their companion diagnostic collaboration beyond cancer into future therapies for chronic diseases.
Under the agreement, Qiagen will develop and validate a genotyping assay using its QiaStat-Dx platform that will allow specialty care providers to perform genotyping while patients are undergoing routine clinical examination, the company said in a statement. The genotyping assay may help determine whether patients are well suited for AstraZeneca's genomically targeted medicines.
"We are pleased to expand our partnership with AstraZeneca into new disease areas using our QiaStat-Dx system and to develop together the first companion diagnostic for chronic diseases based on this platform," Fernando Beils, senior VP and head of the molecular diagnostics business area at Qiagen, said in a statement. "The development of the QiaStat-Dx genotyping assay with AstraZeneca showcases Qiagen's expertise in companion diagnostic development and commercialization, utilizing the most suitable molecular testing platform to meet the unique clinical and commercial needs of patient testing."
The QiaStat-Dx system uses real-time PCR and returns results in about an hour.
Qiagen noted that it has master collaboration agreements to develop and commercialize companion diagnostics with more than 30 companies.