(Alliance News) - Genedrive PLC on Monday said it has signed an agreement with Cytiva to collaborate on development of a Covid-19 PCR test which could be rapidly manufactured and would not need to be refrigerated.
Shares in Genedrive climbed 36% in morning trading to 79.00 pence in London.
The Genedrive 96 SARS-CoV-2 assay combines Genedrive's PCR chemistry with Cytiva's LyoStable stabilisation technology. Cytiva used to be known as GE Life Sciences and was part of General Electric Co before being acquired by Danaher Corp for USD21.4 billion.
According to Genedrive "the combination would allow for high throughput manufacturing of over 10,000 tests per hour in a 96-well, temperature-stable plate format that could be transported globally without the need for refrigeration".
It is a one-step test and can be performed using a number of open PCR platforms. A PCR or polymerise chain reaction test can tell it a person is currently infected with Covid-19.
Genedrive explained that with the increasing global spread of the virus, "millions of people" will likely need to be tested with "high throughput PCR molecular testing" to be a central part of this.
David Budd, chief executive at Genedrive, said: "We have extensive experience working with the Cytiva team on assay development and manufacturing for our point of care HCV, AIHL, and military programmes. We are pleased to now apply that partnership in a high throughput manufacturing process, which we believe places us amongst a small group of companies that have the capability to produce simple assay solutions at significant scale. We are working very aggressively and plan to have product available in the next five weeks."
By Anna Farley; annafarley@alliancenews.com
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Genedrive (GDR)