Company Profile:
Edico Genome
Edico Genome is developing the DRAGEN™ Bio-IT Processor, the world’s first next-generation sequencing (NGS) bioinformatics application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC). As the cost of sequencing has plummeted and the $1,000 genome has been achieved, the analysis and transfer of raw data generated by sequencers has become a critical bottleneck in the utilization of data for clinical applications. DRAGEN radically reduces the computational time required for NGS data analysis from many hours down to only a few minutes. The mapping, alignment, sorting and variant calling that is currently performed by software on extensive cluster or cloud-based platforms, is performed at a fraction of the computing cost by DRAGEN - without compromising accuracy. The chip addresses the bottleneck of big data in genomics, making it faster, easier and cheaper to work with NGS data to discover links between DNA variations and human disease. DRAGEN has the potential to have a large impact on many areas of medicine, particularly in oncology and non-invasive prenatal testing.
Q: How will it help people live to their greatest potential or contribute to making the world healthier?
A: The ability to analyze a person’s DNA at the push of a button with unprecedented speed, scale, and accuracy, at reduced cost, increases the potential for by physicians and patients to use genomic medicine routinely. Quick and cost effective genome analysis could have a significant impact on many areas of healthcare, including non-invasive prenatal testing, cancer diagnostics, and selecting personalized treatments. Faster and cheaper analysis could also advance ongoing research to identify links between sequence mutations and disease to propel further use of genomics in the clinic.
Q: What's the most inventive, innovative, or disruptive aspect of your initiative?
A: The current industry standard for analyzing genomic data involves algorithms that run on expensive server clusters. We have created the world’s first next-generation sequencing bioinformatics chip, the DRAGEN Bio-IT processor, which embeds highly optimized versions of those algorithms in efficient hardware. Our processor reduces the time required for analyzing a whole human genome from 24 hours (using the current industry standard) to 18 minutes or less, while maintaining or improving accuracy and reducing costs related to storage space and IT infrastructure.
Q: Five years from now, what would you like to be able to say has been your most important contribution to health?
A: We would like to enable personalized medicine to be used routinely and broadly by physicians and patients. I envision a day where a general practitioner could sequence and analyze your entire genome while you wait. Diagnoses would be faster, cheaper, and more accurate. The $1,000 genome brings us closer to this point than ever, but to make this vision a reality, the bottleneck of data analysis must be overcome.
Q: What single word or phrase best describes the culture of your startup and why?
A: Unconventional multidisciplinary approach to improving healthcare.
Q: Please tell us how your business idea was conceived. Was there an "aha" moment or did it evolve gradually?
A: I was traveling in Africa, looking into potential cell phone-based technologies that could help with the diagnosis of tuberculosis in rural clinics when I discovered the bottleneck in processing genomic data. Sequencing samples to test for TB required too much time and infrastructure, including expensive servers and IT professionals. As an electrical engineer, I saw the potential to build a chip that could replace those servers and speed data analysis while maintaining accuracy.