Psomagen readies to roll out self Covid-19 test kit this year

Psomagen, Inc., a sequencing and data analysis firm under Korean parent company Macrogen, is readying a revolutionary self test kit on Covid-19 that can save visits to test centers for rollout within the year.

The CLIA-certified and CAP-accredited laboratory based in Rockville, Maryland, the United States, is aiming to complete the development of so-called COVID-19 At-home Collection within this year, the company’s chief executive Ryan Kim told Maeil Business Newspaper on Thursday.

Psomagen, founded in 2004 as a subsidiary of Kospi-listed Macrogen, became the first foreign company to meet special conditions for money-losing but promising ventures to go public on the Kosdaq market last year.

Kim said this service could be a game changer in the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic as its convenience will lead to early detection and prevention of the virus spread.

Despite the rollout of Covid-19 vaccines and therapies, demand for Covid-19 test kits will not cool down especially at schools, public places and businesses because it will take a considerable amount of time for vaccines to be distributed worldwide, Kim said.

Psomagen has offered its own Covid-19 RT test service across the United States since it was approved for emergency use by the Food and Drug Administration in June last year.

Since 2014, it has also provided Moderna, a rare Covid-19 vaccine provider, with sequencing services containing the genetic information of RNA studied by the US vaccine developer, Kim explained.

Psomagen plans to launch a microbiome analysis service in the second half of this year, while developing a clinical diagnosis solution for hospitals based on its proprietary genome analysis technology. Psomagen acquired core assets such as 246 patents and about 300,000 data from bankrupt microbiome startup uBiome in 2019.

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