Akonni Biosystems Inc. and Chinese in vitro diagnostics company, Righton, announce a commercial agreement that enables Righton to sell Akonni’s products for nucleic acid purification and molecular diagnostics to researchers, clinical laboratories, and hospitals in China. The products to be sold include TruTip®, Akonni’s best-in-class sample preparation technology, which is low-cost and simple, yet highly effective at purifying DNA and RNA from the most difficult sample types. In addition, for diagnostic applications, Righton plans to commercialize Akonni’s TruDiagnosis® system based on the proprietary TruArray® multiplexed diagnostic solutions. Righton has made an equity investment of $7.5 million USD in Akonni’s series D fundraising round bringing the total investments in the Series D round to $13.9 million USD.
The two-way license agreement also grants Akonni exclusive rights to Righton’s extensive molecular diagnostic product portfolio outside of China. Righton has established itself as a major player in the >$1 billion USD molecular diagnostics industry in China, with 28 CFDA-approved diagnostic tests, a well-established customer base, distribution and manufacturing infrastructure, and 2017 annual revenues exceeding 180 million RMB. Righton’s established diagnostic tests utilize a combination of real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR), next-generation sequencing (NGS) and droplet digital PCR (ddPCR) technologies, etc., focusing on applications such as Leukemia, Lymphoma and solid tumors in Oncology, and 30 different infectious diseases. They have an established customer base in more than 400 tertiary hospitals in 29 provinces in China.