The new agreement, which builds on the existing collaboration between both companies announced on 3 February 2016, aims at accelerating access to RAS biomarker information in up to 10 European countries.
For metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC) patients, timely information on the presence of mutations in the RAS genes (KRAS, NRAS) and BRAF is critical for treatment selection.
Current technologies to assess RAS gene mutational status used by hospitals are complex to perform and on average, require up to 1 month to provide results. In certain countries, RAS testing samples have to be sent abroad, which further delays results and treatment selection for patients.
Based on the experience from the existing collaboration, Biocartis and Amgen will now aim to enable several dozen additional selected hospitals in Europe to accelerate access to RAS biomarker information, from up to one month to same-day results for mCRC patients, using Biocartis' Idylla platform and RAS tests.
Biocartis' CE-marked RAS mutations test offering has a turn-around-time of only 2 hours with less than 2 minutes of hands-on time. Furthermore, the Idylla platform can be operated in any hospital laboratory, independent of hospital size, available infrastructure and experience level.
Ulrik Cordes, EVP Pharma Collaborations and Companion Diagnostics, commented: "We are very pleased to have expanded our agreement with Amgen. This strong partnership will help to further boost the footprint of Idylla systems in Europe. Additionally, it is another step towards our ultimate goal of improving patient access to rapid and reliable biomarker information with the potential to enable more rapid treatment selection."
The expansion of Biocartis' agreement with Amgen is part of Biocartis' active partnership strategy for its Idylla platform, aimed at enabling personalised medicine for patients across the globe through rapid, highly accurate and easy to use high precision diagnostic solutions.
The collaboration also includes the possibility to use the Idylla platform in scientific studies to further understand the role of biomarkers in clinical practice.