YGEN.L Regulatory News (YGEN)

Premaitha Health PLC

("Premaitha," the "Company" or the "Group")

$1 million collaboration agreement

Partnership to provide genetic testing based on next generation sequencing for oncology

Manchester, UK - 4 October 2018: Premaitha (AIM: NIPT), a leading international molecular diagnostics group, announces a new partnership agreement between the Group's Yourgene Bioscience division ("Yourgene") and a leading clinical research organisation in Taiwan (the "Partner"), to deliver next generation sequencing ("NGS") testing in oncology.

Under the terms of the partnership, Yourgene will provide genetic testing services using NGS technology on patient samples gathered by the Partner for the purpose of research into early stage cancer screening.

This is the first phase of collaboration between Yourgene and the Partner and further project phases are anticipated in the future. The initial phase is anticipated to generate approximately US$1 million of revenues over the next 6-12 months.

Lyn Rees, Chief Executive Officer of Premaitha, commented: "This partnership is directly in-line with our strategy to diversify Premaitha's products and services by leveraging the Group's existing expertise in collaboration with global partners, as we further our commercialisation. This collaboration helps provide greater revenue visibility as we look to execute on our strategy of becoming a truly global business. I am delighted to partner with an organisation of this breadth and scale, and look forward to sharing future progress as we continue to extend our offering."

This announcement contains inside information for the purposes of Article 7 of EU Regulation 596/2014.

About Premaitha 

Premaitha is an international molecular diagnostics group which uses the latest advances in DNA analysis technology to develop safer, faster and regulatory approved genetic screening tests.

The Group's current primary focus is on non-invasive prenatal tests (NIPT) for pregnant women - an emerging, multi-billion dollar global market - although the Group intends to expand its product range into other areas of clinical genetics.

Premaitha's first product, the IONA® test was launched in 2015 as the first CE-IVD NIPT test in Europe. It enables laboratories and healthcare practitioners to offer a complete CE-marked NIPT system in-house. The IONA® test is performed on a maternal blood sample - which contains traces of fetal DNA - and estimates the risk of a fetus being affected with Down's syndrome or other genetic conditions.

Unlike existing prenatal screening methods, due to its high level of accuracy, the IONA® test can significantly reduce the number of women subjected to unnecessary invasive follow up diagnostic procedures, such as amniocentesis, which are costly, resource intensive and carry a risk of miscarriage.

In March 2017, Premaitha acquired Yourgene Bioscience, a specialist next generation sequencing and bioinformatics company based in Taiwan, with its own NIPT screening solution that operates on the same Thermo Fisher next-generation sequencing platform as Premaitha's IONA® test. Yourgene brings significant benefits to the Group through expanded market access in Asia - the world's fastest growing NIPT market - as well as opportunities for cross-selling and the ability to jointly develop expanded test content both within NIPT and beyond.

Since May 2018, the Group has traded as Yourgene Health outside of Europe (but remains as Yourgene Bioscience in Taiwan), reflecting the increased scope of the business in other areas of clinical genetics further to reproductive health; but maintains the Premaitha Health brand within Europe.

Premaitha is headquartered in Manchester, England, with Yourgene offices in Taipei and Singapore. Its shares trade on the AIM market of the London Stock Exchange (AIM: NIPT). For further information, please visit www.premaitha.com. Follow us on twitter @PremaithaHealth.