Thread by @sbarnettARK

Interesting that Exact acquired Ashion (private) ostensibly to bring tumor-normal profiling onto the platform. This comes after they got exclusive rights to the TARDIS platform for MRD testing. Both Ashion and TARDIS come out of @TGen, so likely a smoother integration.

Here's the original TARDIS paper: tgen.org/news/2019/augu…

Seems to be another form of error-corrected sequencing, which is useful for liquid biopsy applications where tumor fraction (amount of cancer in body) is very low, so this reads through to mutation-based early ...

... detection assays (CancerSEEK) as well as for MRD, where tumor burden is low, but more emphasis on dynamics of the tumor (treatment resistance, clonal evolution, etc) in addition to just quantification of the tumor (ctDNA % up or down).

Separately, this is a great example of what vertical integration looks like in the molecular diagnostics industry.

Exact may have acquired Base Genomics, a firm specializing in DNA #methylation detection for cancer screening, to bolster its . . .

. . . operating costs for its screening tests that utilize DNA methylation, such as Cologuard and CancerSEEK. Methylation is an especially tricky biomarker to detect cost-effectively in early-stage cancer samples. Why? Read the primer below by Twist:

twistbioscience.com/sites/default/…

Though I don't know the specifics, perhaps Base Genomics' technology aligned with Exact's DNA methylation needs, and given the buy/build dynamic and possible forecasting of near-future test volume, the company decided to avoid paying a small fee to a third party w/ each test.