Complete Genomics today reported on its commercial success. Complete Genomics now has more than 30 customers and a strong pipeline with booked orders exceeding 500 human genomes. Its new customers, which range from academic institutions and genome centers to pharmaceutical companies, include Eli Lilly, the University of North Carolina, the Institute of Molecular Medicine at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Institute of Cancer Research UK, Academic Medical Center (AMC) University of Amsterdam, and the Department of Bioinformatics, Erasmus Medical Centre in Rotterdam, the Netherlands.

As previously announced, the Institute for Systems Biology (ISB) has reserved sequencing capacity for 100 human genomes at Complete Genomics’ genome center. ISB is now joined by Pfizer and VIB, a life sciences research institute in Flanders, Belgium, which are also conducting large-scale human genome studies with the company.

“We were impressed with the quality of the finished sequences and variant data that Complete Genomics was able to deliver for our five pilot human genomes, allowing our scientists to start immediately with downstream bioinformatics analysis and validation of variants,” said Mark Veugelers, VIB Integration Manager. “In our follow-on study, we plan to investigate neurodegenerative brain diseases, certain congenital diseases, and rare tumor types.”

“Our customers are enjoying the benefits of getting complete human genome data at 99.999% accuracy and a terrific price, using our outsourced solution. We help them accelerate from DNA samples to research-ready data, and skip all the stages in between,” said Dr. Clifford Reid, chairman, president and CEO of Complete Genomics. “Why devote time, money and other resources to purchasing instruments, developing pipelines, and managing and analyzing data, when you can head straight to the research instead? In today’s increasingly competitive research environment, this presents a definite way to get ahead.”

In 2009, Complete Genomics sequenced, analyzed and delivered finished sequences and variant data from 50 complete human genomes to more than 10 customers. Each customer received the assembled sequences and a functional annotation report, describing changes to gene products that each variation had caused, as well as the novelty rates of variations found, when compared to the reference genome.

Customers are using Complete Genomics’ DNA sequencing service to study a spectrum of human diseases and disorders, including cancer; complex diseases including central nervous system disorders such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder; and rare Mendelian diseases such as hypercholesterolemia and Miller syndrome.