Selexis SA has made key strategic hires, signed its one hundredth commercial license agreement (CLA), and purchased and installed $2 million in new laboratory equipment following its acquisition by JSR Corporation in June 2017. 

The new employees are to be based in Geneva, the U.S., and Tokyo, in the areas of whole genome sequencing, global business development, production and operations. The state-of-the-art laboratory equipment will be housed at the company’s laboratory facility and corporate headquarters, which opened last spring in the heart of Geneva’s biotechnology hub, and will allow Selexis to serve its growing partner base.

“Getting much-needed medicines into the hands of healthcare providers quickly and as safely as possible is – and has been – paramount to Selexis. Our commercial-ready mammalian cell line is helping partners worldwide achieve their objectives with the highest quality and predictability,” said Igor Fisch, PhD, Selexis chief executive officer. “The transition of Selexis into JSR’s Life Sciences division last year strengthened our ability to help our partners develop increasingly complex biotherapeutics such as bi-specific proteins, triabodies, DARPins and novel scaffolds decorated with peptides, to name a few. Additionally, the integration of Selexis with KBI Biopharma, a subsidiary of JSR, allows the production of drug substances for clinical trials in as little as nine months as compared to traditional industry timelines of 16 to 24 months.”

Selexis’ investment in new equipment and employees is primarily directed towards the research and development of novel and proprietary technologies that will enable Selexis to deliver high expressing and stable research cell banks (RCBs) in eight to nine weeks from transfection (currently 14 weeks).