Roche and Hitachi Renew Alliance in Diagnostics

Roche (Basel, Switzerland) and Hitachi (Tokyo, Japan) have renewed their alliance in the diagnostics business by 10-years for the joint development and manufacture of the next generation of instruments and workflow automation solutions for medical laboratories.

The renewed alliance marks a significant milestone towards new platform solutions in Roche’s immunochemistry and clinical chemistry business that will help laboratories meet future needs. The extended 10-year agreement strengthens Roche’s pioneering market position.

The two companies have had a successful partnership for 36-years; this yielded a number of industry-first innovations in modular designed analyzer platforms and workflow automation instruments for the laboratory’s serum work area. This resulted in more than 55,000 installations in immunodiagnostics and clinical chemistry worldwide.

Beginning in 1978, the two companies collaborated on the sale and development of automated analyzers for the clinical laboratory testing of body fluids. Since then, a new generation of laboratory solutions has paved the way for a sequence of industry-first innovations under the cobas name. Today, cobas instruments represent the industry benchmark owing to the flexibility, accuracy, speed, and medical value they provide for clinical decision-making worldwide. Combined with the Elecsys electroluminescence (ECL) testing technology, they augment Roche’s immunochemistry line-up.

Jean-Claude Gottraux, head of Roche professional diagnostics, commented, “The new agreement is an important new chapter for us as we’re entering a new generation of modular laboratory solutions over the next few years. Thanks to an ideal combination of both parties’ expertise, our diagnostics solutions allow customers to choose from the broadest set of instruments available for each laboratory setting. Apart from that, we enjoy a competitive advantage from an expanding selection of over 100 different tests in immunochemistry alone, the benchmark in the industry for a consolidated instrument series.”

Yasukuni Koga, head of the medical systems sales and marketing division, Hitachi High-Technologies Corp. said, “Concurrent with our future platform strategy, Hitachi High-Tech is contributing to Roche’s concept of addressing the various needs of healthcare professionals with customized and modular solutions that help consolidate and integrate complex laboratory workflows across the whole work chain. The renewed agreement allows both companies to apply their strengths more effectively, and we expect the result to be continuing success for all of us.”

Roche is a leader in research-focused healthcare with combined strengths in pharmaceuticals and diagnostics. It is a large biotech company, with truly differentiated medicines in oncology, immunology, infectious diseases, ophthalmology and neuroscience. Roche is also a leader in in vitro diagnostics and tissue-based cancer diagnostics, and a frontrunner in diabetes management. Roche’s personalized healthcare strategy aims at providing medicines and diagnostics that enable tangible improvements in the health, quality of life and survival of patients.

Hitachi High-Technologies Corp. is engaged in activities in a broad range of fields, including electronic device systems, fine technology systems, science & medical systems, industrial & IT systems, and advanced industrial products.

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