Helicos Expects Between Five and 10 Orders for HeliScope by End of Year

How hot is genomics today? There are several manufacturers of the machines that will accomplish running our DNA, our complete DNA. I know to the average person this gets a little confusing, but the companies listed here are the companies that manufacture the machines that do the entire work up, and companies that provide specialized genomic testing for specific treatment plans for cancer and other drugs, either purchase on of these machines, or use the services of a company or university who has purchased one, in other words the sequencing has to either be done by purchasing a machine directly or using a company who uses the services provided by one of these companies.

Here is a related story where applications are being taken for grants using Helicos technology.

Information on Genomics Counseling for both physicians and Patients can be found here.

To read further about Helicos, I did an interview with Dr. Milos, their Chief Science Office back in August, and I learned quite a bit myself from the process and the one item Dr. Milos and I were in complete agreement on, being I am from the code technology side of things, is that “EVERYTHING REVOLVES AROUND SOFTWARE”. Come to think of it, there’s almost not one area today where software has not touched a part of how we live.

This post will help explain the process and the difference between a full sequence and a partial DNA read. I post quite a bit about personalized medicine and genomics so you can do a search here and find additional relates items as well.

Pharmacogenomics is the ability to understand risk. With genomic research we are able to find the right medication for patient treatment plans, and know up front what side effects may be present. Expression analysis allows this to occur, and examines the single gene interactions with drugs. Drugs as well as drug combinations are optimized for each individual's unique genetic makeup and creates a plan which is called "Personalized Medicine", in other words a plan created specially for each patient created to avoid potential dangerous side effects along with determining how effective the medications will be for the individual.

And I have to throw this picture in for good measure, one of my favorites, Microsoft Surface Technology with protein folding, hands on…someday soon? The race is certainly on with genomics today. BD

__________________________________________________________

NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – Helicos BioSciences President and CEO Steve Lombardi said today that the firm expects to have a total of between five and 10 orders placed for its flagship HeliScope single-molecule sequencing instrument by the end of this year.

Lombardi told investors at the UBS Global Life Sciences Conference here that the firm also anticipates a total of 15 to 30 orders for its Genetic Analysis System, which includes the HeliScope, by mid-2009. He said Helicos currently has 13 HeliScopes in various stages of assembly and testing at its factory, and he noted that eight of the machines are at a point in the production process that they can run customer samples.

Though Helicos’ system costs significantly more than those offered by its competitors — Illumina, Applied Biosystems, and Roche 454 — Lombardi said that the total cost of ownership, when taking into account extra costs such as sample prep and reagents, is roughly $1.35 million versus $1.16 million from the competing product.

http://www.genomeweb.com/issues/news/149628-1.html?CMP=OTC-RSS