A Medical Device Daily
Rules-Based Medicine, (RBM; Austin, Texas) a biomarker testing laboratory for the life sciences industry, reported that it is partnering with the Novagen brand of EMD Chemicals (EMD; Darmstadt, Germany ), a subsidiary of Merck (also Darmstadt), to develop and distribute immunoassay products on the Luminex, xMap platform.
RBM is granting EMD/Merck exclusive distribution rights to the largest catalog of quantitative protein multiplex assays currently available.
RBM will combine its comprehensive testing content with the international sales and marketing network of EMD/Merck to provide optimized kits that enable researchers to measure hundreds of important biomarkers from serum, plasma and other biological fluids.
“While we’ve been very successful in developing these assays and providing testing services to our clients, we realized that we needed to satisfy the demands of the broader research market by packaging our immunoassay products as kits,” said T. Craig Benson, CEO of Rules-Based Medicine. “EMD/Merck provides the international sales and marketing infrastructure to distribute these kits, co-branded with their well-known and respected Novagen® brand.”
Scheduled for availability in mid-2008, the co-branded kits will be sold to pharmaceutical and biotech companies, and academic institutions. RBM and EMD/Merck will also collaborate to design new products that meet the evolving requirements of their customers.
“We’re pleased to be working with RBM to bring these highly validated multi-analyte profiling kits to the worldwide market,” said Lisa Johnson, VP of corporate development with EMD.
“Working together, we will leverage the first-class reputation of RBM and their extensive assay content with our global sales and distribution network to deliver a wide range of reproducible and quantitative immunoassay kits to researchers worldwide,” she said.
In another agreement, Premier Purchasing Partners (Charlotte, North Carolina) reported that a new agreement for wall desks and patient-charting equipment and supplies has been awarded to First Healthcare Products, a small business enterprise supplier.
The 28-month agreement, effective Jan. 1, 2008, is available to acute-care and continuum-of-care members of the Premier alliance.
Premier touts itself as the largest healthcare alliance in the U.S.