NEC Corporation (NEC) and SomaLogic have signed an agreement to explore and accelerate worldwide clinical use of SomaLogic's aptamer-based diagnostic technology in the life sciences and healthcare markets.

The agreement aims to develop and implement applications within NEC’s cloud-based services platform to enhance SomaLogic’s products for life sciences research and molecular diagnostics.

NEC senior vice president Tadashi Higashino said that NEC is pleased to work with SomaLogic in the field of molecular diagnostics and they believe that both companies can leverage their experiences and integrate them to provide for better healthcare, and thus enhance people’s lives, worldwide.

SomaLogic has developed a proteomics platform for both biomarker discovery and diagnostics applications which, the company claimed, can detect nearly a thousand proteins to identify disease-associated protein signatures from a single drop of blood.

SomaLogic founder and CEO Larry Gold said that the parties envision integrating this powerful new technology with NEC’s Bioprism, the life science research support system, and other NEC data analysis tools, including its SVM expertise.

“This agreement gives us a firm basis on which to create new possibilities for the future. We are delighted with NEC’s foresight, and we look forward to working with our NEC colleagues to find efficient and effective ways to optimize the research and clinical impact of our work,” Gold said.