Co-Diagnostics, Inc., a molecular diagnostics company with a unique, proprietary platform for the development of molecular diagnostic tests, announced today that it has been awarded a patent from the United States Patent and Trademark Office related to the Company's CoPrimer™ platform technology.
Dwight Egan, CEO of Co-Diagnostics, commented, "We are very pleased that the remarkable capabilities of our flagship technology has been awarded patent protection. Now that the groundbreaking work and advancements of our co-founder, Dr. Brent Satterfield, in the field of PCR technology have been officially recognized by the granting of this patent, the Company is prepared to begin offering CoPrimers as a platform technology under license agreements with manufacturers and developers of molecular diagnostics in a broad array of industry segments. With some recent reports estimating the size of the PCR industry alone to reach over $7 Billion within the next several years, the ability to monetize and safely license our technology in this space has never been more important, nor more valuable.
"In addition to successful developments announced recently in AgBio, next-gen sequencing and genotyping, and cancer screening and detection, the CoPrimer technology also forms the foundation of our innovative infectious disease detection products, many of which are proceeding through the regulatory processes that will allow us to meet customer expectations in their respective target markets. This patent not only affords us the full protection of the USPTO for licensing activities, it also provides additional confirmation of the uniqueness of our technology and what sets Co-Diagnostics apart from the rest of the industry."
Patent no. 10,093,966, "COOPERATIVE PRIMERS, PROBES, AND APPLICATIONS THEREOF," covers the method for synthesizing a nucleic acid molecule in the structure first developed by Dr. Satterfield in 2012. This molecule, called a "CoPrimer," underpins the technology that has been shown to enhance the output of polymerase chain reaction ("PCR") molecular diagnostic tests by dramatically minimizing false positive test results. Traditional primer molecules in PCR technology will often cause false results by interacting with each other rather than the target sequence. The patented structure of CoPrimers prevents this interaction, making the technology ideal for a wide array of PCR applications, including infectious diseases, multiplexing of PCR reactions, SNP/SNV detection, agricultural and food supply chain uses, liquid biopsy, and next generation sequencing.