New Siemens–Illumina partnership targets clinical infectious disease testing using next-generation sequencing

Siemens Healthcare Diagnostics and Illumina have entered into a partnership aimed at setting new standards in the use of next-generation sequencing for the rapid, accurate identification of patients’ infectious disease states and potential treatment paths. Through this agreement, the companies plan to make existing Siemens molecular HIV tests compatible with the recently launched Illumina MiSeq next-generation sequencing platform, with the ultimate goal of introducing breakthrough sequencing-based infectious disease assays for the clinical diagnostics market.
Ten years ago the TRUGENE HIV-1 Genotyping Assay, the first DNA sequencing-based test for HIV to be cleared by the FDA, was launched to a worldwide market. This laid the foundation for Siemens to become a leader in infectious disease testing solutions that employ DNA sequencing technology. Since then, TRUGENE has become one of the market’s leading DNA sequencing tests for infectious disease testing. By making this test compatible with Illumina’s MiSeq analyser, Siemens expects to be well positioned to help even more clinical laboratories leverage next-generation sequencing for their infectious disease testing with the fastest turnaround time and highest accuracy possible.