A LinkedIn post by Sarah Hartley-Kane on the UK becoming the 'Silicon Valley of Global Genomics' linkedin.com/posts/sarahhk_…
The cost of a whole genome is probably already in the $100 mark, but not widely available: the only companies that have shown realistic goals towards the $100 genome are: MGI Tech with their DNBSEQ-T7 and T10x4 large instruments, together with @UltimaGenomics with their U100 ...
which is expected to be commercially available in 2023 and produces $1/Gb reads (albeit short-reads with homopolymer noise), and $ONT.L Oxford @nanopore, which is currently closing into the $2/Gb mark of Q20+ single pass reads on the PromethION flowcells
So how far are we from the $100 Genome and who is closer? By the looks of it, MGI Tech is the closest to dethrone $ILMN Illumina in producing 2x150bp Q30 short-reads at $1/Gb, but it will take time for them to be commercially available worldwide with the T7/T10x4 sequencers.
Then @UltimaGenomics is probably the closest to be able to produce $1/Gb short-reads, and sell them as part of $1-3M+ sequencing factory setups, initially in the US then later in other territories. These $1/Gb short-reads are single-end and have homopolymers issues.
Finally, $ONT.L Oxford @nanopore is in the $6-2/Gb range now with their PromethION line, and have been previously criticized for the low basecalling quality of their single-pass reads, but since Kit14 became available 4-6 weeks ago, the status quo has changed: it is now ...
... a new reality that Kit14 can produce consistently $4-3/Gb runs of Q20+ single-pass reads, which for human genome sequencing could mean a 20x QV50+ (consensus) for 99% of the genome. That still is not $1/Gb Q30 long-reads mark, but at the same time one can get there with ...
... a much lower CAPEX starting point, with the P2/P2 Solo now putting NovaSeq levels of $/Gb with a CAPEX of a fraction of a mid-throughput sequencer (NextSeq/AVITI/G4/G400)
So all in all, the $100 Genome is closer than many people think, and it will change the way we understand the field of #genomics and #multiomics, both in scientific terms but also in market share terms.
Another twitter profile of one of the #biotech#stocks that I track, this time it's $TWST TwistBio. The company is a DNA Write company, currently applying their tech to #SynthBio, #NGS and #AntibodyDiscovery
The different segments are easy to explain, and in many cases we can draw analogies to $ILMN Illumina in #NGS: they provide products and services to different segments as a 'tools' provider. Now on to Twist Biopharma, here is were things get complicated.
Twist Biopharma is by all intends an purposes just another branch that concentrates on the antibody side of things. Part of what they offer is just more 'products and services', like they would do with NGS or SynthBio. The complicated part is their intention to also engage...
In #biotech#stocks, another market opening, another tough readjustement of expectations for $NVTA Invitae at -7% opening.
The 5-day chart shows a seesawing pattern, with peaks coming from the 1-2 initial hours of market, which quickly deflate either within the day's trade value or the next day. As mentioned before in this twitter account, the shape of these can sometimes be indicative of a large...
... institutional fund loading up, submitting orders at a certain tick for a certain period of time, and adjusting the rate of buys to the response from the rest of the market. $NVTA Invitae's top institutional holders are well spread, with @ARKInvest on top at 12.5%
The field of #NGS is heating up and new contenders are now shipping their new instruments out there. MGI Tech is heading to both the US and the main European markets, whereas Element Bio, Singular and Ultima Genomics are starting in the US first, aiming at outside US the in 2023.
There are other companies with new tech out there that want to use to displace $ILMN Illumina's market share, including $PACB PacBio which is giving an update on their new tech in October, and $ONT.L Oxford @nanopore that has been shipping Kit14 for the last couple of months now.
$ILMN Illumina themselves are pencilled for their Chemistry X update, but for the noises they've made so far, it seems this will be a platform update, meaning the now 1000s of NovaSeqs and NextSeqs out there will need to be replaced. Think multi-year wave of stock update.
In #biotech#stocks news, $TXG @10xGenomics is opening upwards +4% in today's trading. The company is down more than 75% in the 52-wk window. They peaked in Q1 2021 and have since then declined at a similar pace as other $XBI stocks out there.
$TXG is in the #Singlecell and #Spatial biology field. They've recently made their pivot into Spatial Biology apparent, and have both an #NGS Next-Generation Sequencing and #InSitu imaging play on it, with their #Visium and #Xenium lines respectively.
The $TXG top institutional holders include Morgan Stanley with less than 10%, followed by 3 of the heavy hitters in #biotech: UK's Baillie Gifford, Vanguard Group, and Black Rock.
$EXAS Exact Sciences is one of the companies I track, in many ways a pioneer in the #LiquidBiopsy#CancerScreening field although with a low-tech method compared to other players in this field such as $ILMN Illumina (via @GrailBio), and what other companies are planning ...
The London stock market is now closed and $ONT.L Oxford @nanopore is presenting technology updates. I'll live tweet my highlights, but won't be thoroughly complete with screenshots (thread)