PLEASANTON, California, April 13, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Roche (SIX: RO, ROG; OTCQX: RHHBY) today announced it has acquired CAPP Medical, a genomics research company founded by Stanford University oncologists and industry veterans, to advance the development of technology for cancer screening and monitoring through the detection of circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) in blood.  CAPP Medical's novel technology¹ is designed to isolate and quantify small amounts of ctDNA through a simple blood draw, which has the potential to be used for cancer therapy selection and monitoring tumor response and resistance to therapy.

"Roche believes focused and high quality next generation sequencing (NGS) assays using simple blood draws have the potential to significantly advance the time of cancer diagnosis and change routine cancer diagnostic monitoring and may be highly cost effective compared to today's current standard of using PET and CT imaging to monitor tumor progression," said Roland Diggelmann COO Roche Diagnostics. "CAPP Medical's technology for detecting the circulating cancer DNA from blood has the potential to further strengthen Roche's diagnostic offerings for patients and will provide valuable clinical trial support for Pharma oncology pipelines."

"This acquisition highlights Roche's commitment to advancing cancer testing," said Ashok Krishnamurthi, CEO of CAPP Medical. "We strongly believe Roche is the best suited company to advance this technology and bring it to its full potential."

About CAPP Medical
CAPP Medical is a privately held company located in Palo Alto, CA, founded in October 2013. CAPP Medical is developing disruptive liquid non-invasive cancer detection technology using next generation DNA sequencing. Its technology allows for sensitivity and specificity without the need for patient specific optimizations. At the core of CAPP Medical's technology is the assay design and the bioinformatics that allow for the detection of multiple mutations with a single assay. This results in rapid cancer detection technology that may provide actionable results to clinicians, accelerate oncology drug development, is complimentary to existing modalities and is cost effective and scalable.

¹ CAPP Medical technology is for Research Use Only. Not for use in diagnostic procedures.

About Roche
Headquartered in Basel, Switzerland, Roche is a leader in research-focused healthcare with combined strengths in pharmaceuticals and diagnostics. Roche is the world's largest biotech company, with truly differentiated medicines in oncology, immunology, infectious diseases, ophthalmology and neuroscience. Roche is also the world leader in in vitro diagnostics and tissue-based cancer diagnostics, and a frontrunner in diabetes management. Roche's personalised healthcare strategy aims at providing medicines and diagnostics that enable tangible improvements in the health, quality of life and survival of patients. Founded in 1896, Roche has been making important contributions to global health for more than a century. Twenty-four medicines developed by Roche are included in the World Health Organization Model Lists of Essential Medicines, among them life-saving antibiotics, antimalarials and chemotherapy.

In 2014, the Roche Group employed 88,500 people worldwide, invested 8.9 billion Swiss francs in R&D and posted sales of 47.5 billion Swiss francs. Genentech, in the United States, is a wholly owned member of the Roche Group. Roche is the majority shareholder in Chugai Pharmaceutical, Japan. For more information, please visit roche.com.

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Roche Sequencing Media Relations
Jacquie Bucher
Head of Corporate Communications
Phone: +1 520.468.9145
Email: jacquie.bucher@ventana.roche.com

SOURCE Roche