January 11, 2023 – Mayo Clinic Laboratories, a leading reference laboratory, and Helix, the nation’s leading population genomics and viral surveillance company, today announced a new strategic collaboration that will provide biopharma customers access to a comprehensive joint laboratory offering for research and development initiatives across the drug development lifecycle.
The offering will include a full spectrum of testing capabilities that leverages both Helix’s suite of next generation sequencing capabilities and Mayo Clinic Laboratories’ portfolio of more than 3,800 tests and pathology services. Together, Mayo Clinic Laboratories and Helix also will provide biopharma customers with full end-to-end laboratory testing support.
“By pairing Helix’s innovative Exome+Ⓡ assay with Mayo’s world-class clinical and diagnostic testing knowledge, this collaboration will allow biopharma companies to access molecular and nonmolecular testing services needed across the drug development process,” says William Morice II, M.D., Ph.D., president and CEO of Mayo Clinic Laboratories. “In addition to the testing knowledge, our Mayo Clinic physicians and scientists are available for consultation during this process to provide their expertise and guidance.”
This new collaboration builds upon an existing relationship between the two organizations. Helix currently collaborates with the Mayo Clinic Center for Individualized Medicine Tapestry program, which is a 100,000 participant population genomics program. All participants in this program are sequenced using Helix’s Exome+Ⓡ assay at Helix’s clinical laboratory in San Diego.
“We look forward to expanding our collaboration with Mayo Clinic Laboratories to enable a more comprehensive suite of services for the biopharma industry,” says James Lu, M.D., Ph.D., CEO of Helix. “The Mayo Clinic Laboratories and Helix collaboration enables biopharma industry support throughout all phases of the development process — with a particular focus on early-stage clinical assets in hematology, cardiology and oncology.”