Agena and Simceredx Announce Strategic Partnership to Develop and Commercialize Companion Diagnostics in China

San Diego, CA, and Nanjing, JiangSu, March 26, 2018 – Agena Bioscience (Agena) and Simcere Diagnostics (Simceredx), the subsidiary of SIMCERE Pharmaceutical Group, announced today the signing of a strategic partnership agreement focusing on expanding the use of Agena’s MassARRAY^® System for companion diagnostics and pharmacogenetic testing in China.

As a leading pharmaceutical company with strong connections to China’s top tier hospitals, Simcere Diagnostics will concentrate on plans to expand into the field of pharmacogenetic testing, and to develop panels to support companion diagnostics for their drug development pipelines. Supported by a sales organization of 2,000+, Simcere Diagnostics will utilize Agena’s high throughput 384-automated system to support anticipated volumes.

“The MassARRAY System’s flexibility, throughput, and low operational cost is ideal for the needs of our business, which is to reach more patients in China and improve outcomes with high quality diagnostics and medicines.” said Yong Ren, Chief Executive Officer of Simcere Diagnostics. “We were particularly impressed with the coverage and performance of Agena’s pharmacogenetic applications and see great synergy with our business to advance targeted therapies for patients.”

“We are proud to have been chosen by Simcere Diagnostics, a highly-respected pharmaceutical innovator with strong channels to China’s hospital networks.” said Peter Dansky, Chief Executive Officer at Agena Bioscience. “There is great synergy between the goals of our organizations, and we look forward to seeing the commercialization of new companion diagnostics and the growth of PGx testing in China through Simceredx’s strength and expertise in this market.”

Simceredx will be supported by Agena’s commercial operations team in China, which recently doubled in size due to the growth in the region.

About Agena Bioscience
Agena Bioscience develops, manufactures, and supplies genetic analysis systems and reagents, including the MassARRAY^® System. The system is a highly sensitive, cost-effective, mass spectrometry-based platform for high-throughput genetic analysis, and is used globally in diverse research fields such as cancer profiling for solid tumors and liquid biopsies, inherited genetic disease testing, pharmacogenetics, agricultural genomics, and clinical research. For more information about Agena, visit www.agenabio.com.

About Simcere Pharmaceutical Group
Simcere Pharmaceutical Group (Simcere) is a research and development-driven Chinese pharmaceutical company committed to bringing high quality and more effective therapies to patients by combining in-house R&D with global strategic partnerships. Through its State Key Lab of Translational Medicine and Innovative Development, Simcere focuses its efforts on innovative pharmaceuticals and branded generic drugs in the therapeutic areas of oncology, neurology, inflammation/immunology, cardiovascular and infectious diseases. By leveraging partnering experience with multinational pharmaceutical companies and innovative biotech companies, Simcere continues to advance and create value for partners in China. For more information, visit www.simcere.com.

About Simcere Diagnostics
Founded by Simcere Pharmaceutical Group in 2017, Simcere Diagnostics is a precision medicine company based in China and led by a team of highly experienced professionals in medical genomics and informatics. Utilizing various state-of-the-art technology platforms including Next Generation Sequencing, Nanopore sequencing, MassARRAY^® genotyping, digital PCR, as well as advanced bioinformatics, Simcere Diagnostics is committed to fulfilling the unmet medical needs in disease diagnosis, treatment guidance, and progress monitoring via cost-effective and personalized solutions. Simcere Diagnostics is dedicated to developing cutting-edge diagnostic products in the clinical areas of cancer, central nervous system diseases, infectious diseases, pharmacogenomics, and autoimmune disorders.