CINVENTION and Instrumentation Laboratory Intent to Jointly Market the Unique Product Portfolio of CINVENTION

CINVENTION and Instrumentation Laboratory today announced that both companies plan to enter into a distribution and marketing partnership. The scope of the agreement is to market CINVENTION's innovative nano-structured bioactive carrier systems for cell cultivation in the field of bio-manufacturing and tissue engineering. The products are known under the brand names CarboScale and CarboSeed.

CINVENTION, formerly known as Blue Membranes, has developed a unique portfolio of products for cultivating mammalian cells on bio-mimicking nano- structured carbon moulds used in conventional bio-reactor systems. These carrier systems provide tissue-like surfaces attracting cells to attach and proliferate on the bioactive surfaces. The materials for attaching cells are disposables and available both as beads and structured packings. The increase of surfaces by nano-structuring and embedding flow-channels into the structured packings allows increasing the overall surface area of up to 10.000 square meter per 100ml of cell cultivation volume. Compared to conventional cultivation systems, the CINVENTION products allow increasing yields up to 8.000%.

Roberto Galli, Marketing Director of Instrumentation Laboratory Italy, pointed out that the solutions provided by CINVENTION are an attractive combination of GMP conforming disposables, high performance cultivation tools and systems that potentially revolutionize traditional fermentation technologies. "There is a significant demand for disposables and process intensification in the biotech industry. Particularly, the increase in yield and reduction of medium consumption allows for making bio-processes more cost- effective and attractive," he said. "Additionally, these products will make large stirred tanks obsolete and boost the miniaturization and modular production approach."

Soh il Asgari, Chief Technology Officer of CINVENTION, explained that the performance of the nano-structured carbon-materials is not alone based on the effect of surface increase or bio-mimicry. "It is not enough to provide just surfaces. We additionally tailored the materials to take up and release oxygen and carbon dioxide by chemical adsorption and controlled desorption, like an artificial lung. For high cell densities cell cultures also must be supplied with oxygen, and unfavorable acids must be eliminated, that is one of the functions of these disposable materials." He further said that CINVENTION plans to launch the first family of complete bioreactors for disposable use this year. "We clearly address the need for reducing investment costs that are usually related to controlled bioreactor systems. The CINVENTION technology allows controlling cultivation equilibrium and conditions by the material itself. In many applications there is potentially no need for control units and expensive hardware. We are convinced that Instrumentation Laboratory has the competencies and resources to leverage our impact on the bio-manufacturing instrumentation market."

CINVENTION's collaboration with Instrumentation Laboratory is a significant step forward towards entering the established market of bio- manufacturing instrumentation and disposables. CINVENTION is continuously expanding its proprietary product portfolio and pipeline for new products. The company has two business units, i.e. medical device coatings and bio- processing. In the field of medical device coatings CINVENTION successfully has launched its nano-composite carbon-coatings for drug-eluting stents that are expected potentially to overcome the current issues of polymer coated stents, namely late thrombosis.

About CINVENTION

CINVENTION AG, formerly known as Blue Membranes, is a leading technology company focusing on nano-composite materials in biomedical applications. CINVENTION's unique portfolio of Nano-Composite Systems includes: Drug Delivery Coatings, Multifunctional Device Coatings, Advanced Cultivation Systems for Bio-Processing and Systems for Tissue Engineering.

CINVENTION's mission is to exploit its proprietary and highly innovative technology platform for materials and surface engineering of nano-structured composites. Providing a sustainable portfolio of applications in medical device engineering, bio-processing and chemical processing CINVENTION solutions enable its customers to get access to superior technologies for next generation applications and profitable growth.

About Instrumentation Laboratory

Since being founded in 1959, Instrumentation Laboratory has been a leading worldwide developer, manufacturer and distributor of in vitro diagnostic instruments, reagents, controls, consumables and services for use primarily in hospitals and clinical laboratories. Instrumentation Laboratory products include critical care, haemostasis, clinical chemistry, flow citometry, hematology, laboratory data management and molecular biology systems.

Instrumentation laboratory is part of the CH-Werfen Group. CH-Werfen is a privately owned international healthcare corporation, comprised by a group of leading manufacturing and distribution companies. The group is active worldwide in several areas: in-vitro diagnostics, medical devices for the hospital and scientific instruments for industry and research. Since its founding in 1966 CH-Werfen has fully embraced the concept of partnership, continuously leveraging its strengths, resources and commercial possibilities through acquisitions, distribution agreements and strategic alliances. CH-Werfen has always prioritized bringing products to market of the highest value -- quality as technology wise. Therefore the group has increased it´s investment in R&D by more than 40% between 1999 and 2004 (32,2 Mio in 2004). In 2004 the overall turnover exceeded 575 million Euros. The group employs a total of 2806 people, whereby more than 1400 people are globally employed in sales and marketing.

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