Life Technologies Corporation, a global biotechnology company, has announced that DNA Link Inc., a Korean genomic research service provider, has placed an order to purchase ten Ion Proton Sequencers, which are shipping immediately.

Life Technologies introduced the Ion Proton Sequencer in September and its adoption by customers who are familiar with next-generation sequencing in both the US and emerging markets continues to grow significantly.

DNA Link's CEO, Dr Jong Eun Lee, said he expects the $500 million that the Korean government recently set aside to fund genomics research to drive significantly more demand for the one-day sequencing turnaround that the Ion Proton Sequencer delivers.

Dr Lee, whose company processes tens of thousands of samples each year, said the decision to select the Ion Proton System centred around three key factors: speed, throughput and cost.

"It takes two weeks to get results with our current system, and it takes a total of two to three months by the time the data are sequenced and analyzed," said Dr Lee. "People just don't want to wait that long. Getting an exome from sample to analysis in a day will give us a great competitive advantage in the market."

Dr Lee also said the Ion Proton Sequencer's simplified data analysis is a significant advantage.

"The bioinformatics load from these big machines is just too much for us to deal with," said Dr Lee. "The more streamlined bioinformatics pipeline that Ion Torrent offers will help us save time and turn around projects faster to our customers."

Ion Torrent technology has emerged as the most outstanding value in sequencing because of the relentless improvement in semiconductor sequencing performance. These improvements now enable any sequencing application, from targeted resequencing and microbial sequencing to exome sequencing and transcriptome sequencing, and many others.

Life Technologies Korea's general manager, Soojin Seok, said she looked forward to collaborating with Dr Lee to expand his business as Korea moves faster into genomics and sequencing.

"Since Dr Lee purchased the Ion PGM Sequencer a year ago, we have been working closely with him to demonstrate both the quality of Ion Torrent semiconductor sequencing technology, as well as the quality of support he will receive from our Life Technologies staff in Korea," said Seok.

Life Technologies Corporation is a global biotechnology company with customers in more than 160 countries using its innovative solutions to solve some of today's most difficult scientific challenges.