On March 17, 2020, Illumina, Inc. announced a global strategic collaboration with IDbyDNA Inc., a metagenomics technology company setting a standard for detection, identification, and interpretation of microorganisms and their role in human health, to bring comprehensive next-generation sequencing (NGS) based workflows to the global microbiology market. Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati represented IDbyDNA in the transaction.

Under the terms of the agreement, Illumina and IDbyDNA will each co-market IDbyDNA’s proprietary Explify® Platform for use with Illumina’s NGS systems and library preparation to provide a complete, streamlined workflow solution for infectious disease applications. In addition, IDbyDNA and Illumina will co-develop research use only (RUO) workflows.

The collaboration aims to enable broad distribution of NGS equipment and library prep, as well as other reagents to provide high-fidelity NGS analysis, interpretation, and reporting capabilities to laboratories and hospitals around the world for infectious disease applications. The goal is to accelerate and improve testing for infectious diseases. Among the first programs will be to provide improved support to customers globally performing NGS for surveillance purposes during the COVID-19 pandemic.

For more information, please see Illumina's press release.