Invitrogen Enters Into Worldwide Co-Marketing Agreement With genOway Focused On RNAi Services
作者: 整理时间:2005-12-20
12/19/2005
Deal Positions Companies to Address in vivo Target Validation Market
Carlsbad, CA & Lyon, France - Invitrogen Corporation, a provider of essential life science technologies for disease research and drug discovery and genOway, a creator of genetically modified biological models announced the signing of a co-marketing agreement around RNAi related services. Under the terms of the agreement, Invitrogen and genOway will combine Invitrogen's expertise in RNAi research technologies with genOway's portfolio of transgenesis technologies and RNAi in vivo experience to create a services platform offering RNAi vector design through the creation of RNAi transgenic rodent models. Both companies will share revenues but specific financial terms of the collaboration were not disclosed.
An important part of the drug discovery research and development process involves in vivo studies, often performed in animal models. As RNAi technology has advanced, the need to validate RNAi knockdown in model systems has been regarded as the next step in the eventual development of therapeutics based on the technique.
"Combining the services of these two leading RNAi companies will provide researchers with a complete solution to ensure successful RNAi research for drug discovery and therapeutic applications," said Jon Hindar, Senior Vice President of Life Sciences at Invitrogen. "This broad service offering has the potential to significantly accelerate target validation studies in disease research."
"RNAi continues to gain acceptance in drug discovery and development applications," explained Kader Thiam, Head of Transgenic technologies of genOway. "Our leading in vivo RNAi technologies are strengthened by the solid in vitro applications Invitrogen has developed."
RNAi has rapidly become one of the most widely used techniques in drug discovery research. Using RNAi technology, scientists can turn genes "off," enabling them to observe a cell's behavior in the absence of the targeted gene's protein product. This may lead to better understanding of disease mechanisms and eventually, better therapies.
Invitrogen has built a strong RNAi technology portfolio in recent years, first offering a family of products under the BLOCK-iT name in September 2003, including short interfering RNA (siRNA), kits for creating short hairpin RNA (shRNA), and technologies to deliver RNAi reagents to cells and tissues. In November 2003, Invitrogen announced that it had acquired privately-held Sequitur, Inc. of Natick, Mass. Sequitur brought to Invitrogen Stealth technology, a proprietary synthetic RNA molecule that holds advantages over traditional siRNA in specificity, efficacy, stability and reducing "off target" effects of silencing. Invitrogen continues to develop technologies to enhance its comprehensive RNAi solution to address evolving needs of researchers in the formative era of the application. This year Invitrogen launched the BLOCK-iT pol II miR RNAi expression vector kits and services which combine the advantages of traditional RNAi vectors with capabilities for tissue specific expression and multiple target knockdown from the same transcript.
In three years, genOway has become the leading company for in vivo RNAi rodent models. Beginning in 2003 genOway launched its Safe RNAi Transgenesis technology based on random integration of shRNA into ES cells. In 2004 the company launched its RNAi Quick Knock-in technology that allows targeted insertion of the shRNA into a specific gene locus, HPRT. Most recently genOway has started offering a Rat Knock-down R&D program.
SOURCE: Invitrogen Corporation
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