As part of the program, Bayer will use Berkeley Lights' Beacon platform to automate biological workflows and gain efficiencies in its drug development process.
New biologics are complex and time consuming to discover, design, and manufacture. According to a recent Frost & Sullivan report, the introduction of automation into the drug discovery process has the potential to dramatically decrease development timelines1.
Berkeley Lights develops and manufactures platforms that automate many biological processes to help companies realize timeline advantages.
The Beacon platform enables the tracking, monitoring, and visualization of single cell manipulation and cell-to-cell interaction across thousands of cells in a nanofluidic chip.
By stringing together four basic modules, – import, culture, assay, and export-, integrated workflows can be implemented for cell line development, antibody discovery and engineering, gene editing, and research. As a result, customers can reduce hands-on time and accelerate the delivery of actionable results.
"We are excited to support Bayer in their drug discovery and development activities to further execute on their mission to bring novel therapies to market," said Eric Hobbs, PhD, CEO at Berkeley Lights, Inc.
"The Beacon platform brings increased scalability and precision to the discovery and development process. Now Bayer can screen thousands of clones to identify the highest producers with even more precision and speed."
Berkeley Lights (BLI) develops and commercializes platforms on which many bio-pharmaceutical, genomic, and cellular therapy applications will run. BLI launched its first commercial platform, the Beacon™*, in December 2016.