Belgium headquartered firm Biocartis has announced an expansion of its collaboration with Merck Serono Middle East and Merck Saudi, both affiliates of Merck KGaA. The collaboration aims to improve patient access to RAS biomarker testing in the Middle East and North Africa (MEA) region.

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the third most common cancer worldwide, with an estimated incidence of more than 1.9 million new cases annually. Understanding an individual patient’s biomarker status is key to support timely treatment decision-making in metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC). Treatment with anti-epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) monoclonal antibody therapies have shown to improve outcomes in patients with RAS wild-type mCRC3, and have become standard of care for RAS wild-type mCRC.

RAS biomarker testing is cumbersome and not readily available in all parts of the world. The Idylla KRAS Mutation test and Idylla NRAS-BRAF Mutation test are highly performant6 tests that rapidly determine the RAS biomarker status in mCRC tumor tissue samples. Due to the ease-of-use of the Biocartis Idylla Platform, the tests can be deployed in any user setting and in turn aid patient access to biomarker testing globally.

Roger Moody, Chief Executive Officer of Biocartis, said “In our mission to enable universal access to personalized medicine for patients around the world, Biocartis is proud to provide Idylla's cutting-edge technology for mCRC testing across countries in the MEA region."

Ramsey Morad, SVP & Head MEAR - Middle East, Africa, Turkey & Russia/CIS at Merck, added "By leveraging Biocartis' RAS-testing platform, we are confident this will allow treating oncologists to swiftly determine biomarker status and facilitate timely treatment decisions for patients with metastatic colorectal cancer."