InCyte Pharmaceuticals: Biology On A Chip

InCyte Pharmaceuticals was the first of the new biotechnology companies specializing in the science of the human genome to go public, on the back of a technology platform which promises to make biotechnological drug discovery quicker, cheaper and more precise.

Although the technology used at InCyte is clearly based on molecular and cell biology, recombinant DNA and genetic engineering, the service it provides to its customers might better be described as information technology, or rather bioinformatics. President and chief executive of the company, Roy Whitfield, likes to describe the LIFESEQ database as the Gray's Anatomy of tomorrow, "with the ability to change forever medical research." This is an information resource that takes over where Gray's left off - one that enables the exploration of the inner workings of our biological machinery at a level of detail never before possible.

There are plenty of genomics companies around, but InCyte believes it is the first to set up a fee-based genomic information service for the pharmaceutical industry, as well as developing in-house proprietary diagnostic and therapeutic products. The company has already had success selling access to its database and sequencing technology to the industry, which will use it for the discovery of new drug targets. Pfizer and Upjohn have already signed up for the service, and InCyte expects to announce several other agreements before the end of the year.