Scienion: Market-driven chips

The biochip market is dominated by Affymetrix Inc., but Scienion AG believes it has technology that doesn't step on AFFX's toes. The company is selling into the lucrative microbial research market niche, which it hopes could make it profitable next year and obviate the need to raise more venture money.

Scienion is a spinout from the Max-Planck-Institute for Molecular Genetics. "As researchers, we knew that micro-arrays are very versatile tools," said co-CEO and co-founder Holger Eickhoff. "We wanted to make the technology affordable and provide companies and research institutions with customized microarrays with reproducible and reliable results." ...