Strand Genomics, the life sciences informatics company, has entered into a distribution agreement with GeneTech Company for its product Avadis in Hong Kong & China. Avadis is a tool that brings the data mining techniques in software engineering to microarray gene expression data analysis.

The features of visualization, data handling, data mining and data analysis carried by Avadis, together with its competitive price should provide a complete solution for both academic researchers and industrial customers in China," said Deborah Au, Project Manager, Gene Tech Company.

" Dr. Vijay Chandru, CEO, Strand Genomics stated that both Strand and Gene Tech would be doing joint road shows soon to make this market aware of the potential of Avadis and how it fits into their analysis workflow.

Avadis combines scalable analytical algorithms with powerful and interactive visualization to derive valuable insights from the data. The software has easy to use wizards to import Affymetrix files including from GCOS. It also provides a wide range of clustering techniques and statistical tests that make up the complete analysis toolset. It is a comprehensive solution that meets all the needs of gene expression researchers with a superior performance-to-price feature. It is available in three editions - explorer, prophetic and pride.

Gene Tech Company Limited was founded in 2000, in Hong Kong by a group of biotechnologists. The business areas cover development and distribution of full range diagnostic kits and services on research projects such as Affymetrix GeneChips, microarray spotting and sequencing.

With the launch of the 863 Programme in 1986, biotechnology has been identified as one of the rapidly growing areas in China. Funding from the Chinese Government to various biotech sectors, including Biochip, Gene Medicine and Gene Treatment, exceeded $300 million in 2000 and is increasing annually. The funding source is now extended to private sectors and venture capitalists.