Clontech Laboratories, Inc, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Takara Bio Inc, and TET Systems (TET), a privately-held German biotech company based in Heidelberg, have signed an amendment to their existing license agreement. Under the expanded license agreement, Clontech obtains rights to develop, manufacture and commercialize novel TET Systems products as the Tet-On 3G Inducible Expression System.

The Tet-On 3G Inducible Expression System provides highly inducible, sensitive control of gene expression. It includes two novel components, the rights to which were acquired by TET in 2009: (i) an improved transcriptional activator developed by scientists at the Academic Medical Center at the University of Amsterdam (AMC) in the Netherlands, and (ii) a novel minimal Tet promoter developed at the University of Heidelberg in Germany.

The Tet-System currently marketed by Clontech is already the gold standard for regulated gene expression, as measured by more than 7,000 peer-reviewed scientific publications. The new Tet-On 3G Inducible Expression System offers researchers even greater control of gene regulation due to lower expression in the non-induced state, even in transient transfection settings. The system’s ten-fold increased sensitivity for the inducing agent (Doxycycline) will also expand the long-established benefits of dynamic transactivation, particularly for in vivo models.

Carol Lou, general manager of Clontech Laboratories, Inc, comments, “Clontech has a long history of leadership in developing technologies for gene delivery and expression, and a long-standing partnership with Tet Systems. We are pleased to continue and extend this history by adding the Tet-On 3G Inducible Expression System to our portfolio of Tet System Products, which also includes our inducible Lenti-X systems.”

Clontech is launching a broad suite of Tet-On 3G Inducible Expression Systems, including different promoters, fluorescent markers, and bicistronic systems, which will be available August 2nd, 2010.

Clontech Labs, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Takara Bio Inc, develops, manufactures, and distributes a wide range of life science research reagents under the Clontech and Takara brands.

Takara Bio is an innovative biotechnology company based in Shiga, Japan. As a world leader in biotechnology research and development, Takara Bio was the first company to market PCR technology in Japan and is also the developer of the RetroNectin reagent, which is a world-standard in gene therapy protocols.

TET Systems is a privately held company located in Heidelberg, Germany. TET Systems was founded by professor Dr H Bujard and colleagues based on their invention of the Tet Technology, the most widely used method to control gene expression in higher organisms.