QIAGEN acquires additional PCR licenses from Roche and Idaho Technology

09-21-2009: QIAGEN announced that it has acquired additional licenses from Roche and Idaho Technology related to the use of instrumentation and reagents for PCR-based molecular testing. Financial details were not disclosed.

The agreements cover thermal cycler rights and real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) methods for diagnostics and all other applications. In addition, the agreements also cover rights for "high resolution melting curve analysis" (HRM) technology. This novel PCR technology, which is well leveraged by QIAGEN's detection platform Rotor-Gene(TM) Q, opens up a broad array of applications such as mutation discovery, pathogen detection and methylation analysis, as it adds a further information dimension into traditional real time PCR.

With these agreements QIAGEN becomes the first Idaho Technology/ Roche licensee to have full freedom to offer HRM related instruments and reagents under license in all formats and for all purposes in research and diagnostics worldwide. The agreements complement previous settlement arrangements following QIAGEN's 2008 acquisition of Australian PCR cycler manufacturer Corbett.