Biocept Issues Letter to Stockholders
To Our Stockholders:
We are excited about 2019, as we pursue a strategy that we believe will achieve long-term success by:
- Increasing physician adoption of our liquid biopsy testing in Medical Oncology by emphasizing cancer monitoring for progression and/or response to cancer therapeutics;
- Broadening the use of our testing and technology by entering new markets such as urology, pathology and integrative oncology;
- Expanding our global footprint with our distributed kit and liquid biopsy specimen collection tube products; and
- Growing volume and revenue while containing costs.
At
Our Target Selector™ tests require a simple blood sample and allow for profiling cancer biomarkers in a way that is non-invasive, rapid and cost-effective. Among liquid biopsy companies,
Late last year we revamped our commercial organization by recruiting diagnostics industry veteran
We have taken a fresh look at assessing the advantages of our liquid biopsy testing and are developing new approaches to further engage current customers while also expanding into additional oncology segments. A compelling attribute of our Target Selector™ testing is the use of CTCs as well as ctDNA which extends our testing beyond profiling at diagnosis to include monitoring for both response to therapy and for potential disease progression. Offering both CTC and ctDNA testing differentiates
We have also relaunched our EmpowerTC™-
As most of you know, collaborating with respected institutions to produce real-world validation for the high sensitivity of our tests is critical to physician adoption. Last August, we entered into a collaboration with
According to
In another initiative to increase real-world validation for Target Selector™ testing, we are documenting individual case reports in peer-reviewed journals. The most recent series was published in the
To expand our technology platform and market reach, in 2018 we entered into a broad agreement with
In addition to these and other domestic initiatives, we plan to broaden our international footprint and establish
Another aspect of this strategy is making our patented CEE-Sure® blood collection tubes for Research Use Only (RUO) available through VWR, a leading global provider of products and services to laboratory and production customers. Our proprietary collection tubes provide the advantage of safe transport of patient specimens used in liquid biopsy testing without specimen degradation.
We are proud to have tested more than 17,000 patient samples and performed more than 60,000 total Target Selector™ tests, which provides us with a significant database of information. In
We also have a growing IP portfolio, and now have 31 issued patents worldwide in 16 countries. We plan to continue to expand and vigorously enforce our IP in our market space.
Internally, we have focused on automation in our CLIA laboratory to improve workflows and reduce costs. We have hired new leaders in quality, regulatory and laboratory operations with the goal of building a business that can be scaled more efficiently. We also took actions last year to reduce certain expenses and we retired our long-term debt, eliminating more than
As we move through 2019, we are focused on the following initiatives:
- Increasing the market penetration for our Target Selector™ testing;
- Entering into strategic commercial and technology partnerships in the U.S. and in international markets;
- Completing validation of the Oncomine™
NGS Panel ; - Implementing our diagnostic kit launch strategy and growing distribution of our blood collection tubes internationally;
- Launching our Artificial Intelligence initiative with Prognos to evaluate monetizing de-identified information from our liquid biopsy testing platform;
- Signing new third-party health plan agreements;
- Publishing more clinical case studies;
- Commercializing additional oncology biomarker assays; and
- Continuing to pursue patents on our proprietary platforms.
In summary, we are pursuing multiple avenues to capitalize on our proprietary Target Selector™ platform to drive adoption, grow revenues, and create stockholder value. As always, our primary focus is to provide physicians with the necessary information to select the best treatment pathways and to improve outcomes for patients with cancer.
Sincerely,
President and Chief Executive Officer
About
Forward-Looking Statements Disclaimer Statement
This release contains forward-looking statements that are based upon current expectations or beliefs, as well as a number of assumptions about future events. Although we believe that the expectations reflected in the forward-looking statements and the assumptions upon which they are based are reasonable, we can give no assurance that such expectations and assumptions will prove to have been correct. Forward-looking statements are generally identifiable by the use of words like "may," "will," "should," "could," "expect," "anticipate," "estimate," "believe," "intend," or "project" or the negative of these words or other variations on these words or comparable terminology. To the extent that statements in this release are not strictly historical, including without limitation statements as to our ability to improve the outcomes of patients diagnosed with cancer, our ability to achieve our goals and initiatives outlined in our 2019 strategy, our ability to broaden the use of our proprietary technology platform, the success of our
Contact:
LHA Investor Relations
Jcain@lhai.com
310-691-7100
¹Liquid Biopsy Market Size, Share & Trends Analysis Report By Application, By Sample Type (Blood, Urine) By Biomarker Type (CTC, ctDNA, Exosomes), By Technology (NGS, PCR), By Region, And Segment Forecasts, 2018 - 2030
View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/biocept-issues-letter-to-stockholders-300798627.html
SOURCE