By Mary Welch

Genomics One Corp. will raise C$30 million (US$19.85 million) in a private placement of special warrants that will be used to complete key strategic acquisitions, expand marketing of TrueBlue technology, and for research and development purposes.

The anticipated price of the warrants will be C$15 each, and will be converted into 2 million shares of common stock. Currently, Genomics One, based in Laval, Quebec, has about 15 million shares outstanding. Dundee Securities Corp., of Toronto, is handling the placement, which should close by June 30.

"At this stage, this was the maximum we were willing to raise at this price," said Steve Slilaty, the company's chief scientific officer and co-founder. "There are a number of large institutional investors involved in this type of private placement."

In addition to completing key acquisitions, the company intends to use some of the proceeds to market TrueBlue more widely throughout the world.

The TrueBlue technology is the only technology in the world that "allows you to identify with 100 percent accuracy whether or not a cloning experiment has been successful," Slilaty said. "The other technology has 60 percent to 70 percent accuracy. At the end of the day, you're throwing away about 30 percent or 40 percent of the genes and you end up with gaps."

Many in the genomics field believed that these gaps were because there were inherently non-clonable DNA sequences, he said. "With the TrueBlue system, we know that those so-called non-clonable DNA sequences were actually false negative clones."

Genomics One said these sequences are perfectly clonable. Instead, the architecture of the cloning vectors was the culprit that produced "non-clonable DNA sequences." The TrueBlue technology consists of a newly modified IacZa gene fragment that is capable of providing 100 percent accuracy, the company said.

"A lot of people don't know about this and we intend to get the word out on TrueBlue in a large-scale way," Slilaty said. "It will revolutionize the way people do cloning."

In addition to the TrueBlue technology, Genomics One is developing other technology platforms. These include Engineered-Lyticase for use as an industrial enzyme and an antifungal agent; TAG/Anchortm technology for protein expression and development of diagnostic kits; Gene Delivery Systems for gene therapy and research applications; and RS technology for the development of a new class of industrial enzymes and therapeutics.

Genomics One's stock (Montreal Exchange:GNX) closed unchanged Wednesday at C$16.50.