Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
across the globe that provide research materials to laboratories
worldwide. Companies actively market their products at scientific
conferences, often providing sponsorship money for particular
events, if not whole conferences.
Some examples of companies offering products and services to the
emerging iPSC industry are as follows:
•
Under the category of 'Embryonic Stem Cells and iPS Cells
(Human)' Stem Cell Technologies offers some 48 products for
sale. Many of its products are trademark protected and pricing
details are only provided on request. Stem Cell Technologies
began with tissue-culture products for use in cancer research in
Canada in the early 1980s, eventually being spun out into a
private company in the 1990s (
http://www.stemcell.com
). Now,
the company has facilities in Canada, the US and France,
shipping over 1000 products around the world (
http://www.
stemcell.com
). Like Cellular Dynamics and StemGent, it also
offers a range of training courses for cell culture and tissue
handling, including with iPSCs.
Life Technologies, a company created out of the combination of
Invitrogen and Applied Biosystems in 2008, also supplies a range
of products for iPSC research. Life Technologies is a large,
multinational, publicly listed company providing research tools
to the biotechnology industries (
http://www.lifetechnologies.
com
). The company has nearly 4000 patents and licences and in
2009 it reported sales of more than US$3.3 billion ('Company
Background',
http://www.lifetechnologies.com
). Through its
brand Invitrogen, the company offers some 76 iPSC-related
products for sale.
R&D Systems is a smaller publicly listed company offering a
variety of tools for stem cell researchers (
http://www.rdsystems.
com
). Established in 1976, it has two main operating divisions:
one in biotechnology and one in haematology. The head office of
R&D Systems is in the US, with sales representatives in the UK,
Germany and France and subsidiary companies in California
and China. It has around 700 employees and an annual turnover
of over US$200 million ('About Us',
http://www.rdsystems.com
).
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