Fluxion Biosciences announces launch of Discovery Services business

Fluxion Biosciences, a privately held drug discovery tools and services company, announced today that it is launching a Discovery Services business to support growing demand for assay support on Fluxion's unique cell analysis platforms. The new unit, supported by expanded technical personnel and resources, enables Fluxion to offer a range of high-value cell assays in ion channels, functional cell analysis, and circulating tumor cell analysis.

“As our customers in drug discovery and life science research look to increase productivity, they are focusing their own resources on those activities where they add the most value”

The creation of the services unit is driven by customer requests across all application segments. "As our customers in drug discovery and life science research look to increase productivity, they are focusing their own resources on those activities where they add the most value," stated Tom Driscoll, VP of Marketing and Business Development. "This has driven our customers to pursue partnering and outsourcing in a range of areas, including assay development, assay optimization, system maintenance and support, proof-of-concept data, pilot screening, and safety validation assays. Our cell analysis solutions are often focused at challenging, complex live-cell assays, so offering service capabilities on these platforms delivers substantial benefits to both existing and potential customers. We expect many prospective customers to use our services as a cost-effective way to utilize our technology before bringing it in house."

Fluxion provides services on its three unique platforms for cell analysis:

• Ion channel service capabilities on its IonFlux™ system for assay development and optimization, compound screening against ligand- and voltage-gated ion channels, and cardiac safety testing.

• The BioFlux™ system provides a convenient solution to study "in vivo" cell function in a high throughput, low cost "in vitro" format by precise control of the cell micro-environment. Application areas include screening and pharmacology for shear-activated platelet aggregation, leukocyte adhesion, cancer migration, and bacterial biofilm analysis.

• Circulating tumor cell analysis is performed using the IsoFlux™ system. Analytical capabilities include isolation, enumeration, PCR, FISH, NGS, and other molecular diagnostic techniques, using either EpCAM or customer-defined antibodies for cell capture.

To support the launch of the Discovery Services unit, Fluxion is adding personnel and expanding its South San Francisco campus with another 12,000 square feet of lab/office space. Additionally, the field-based team continues to offer assay optimization, installation, training, preventive maintenance, and instrument service for customer-purchased systems globally. Fluxion's systems are in use worldwide; more than 150 systems are installed at leading institutions such as Pfizer, Novartis, Genentech, Bayer, Amgen, Merck, BMS, Sanofi-Aventis, Stanford, Harvard, NIH, and many others.