The Regeneron Genetics Center (RGC) has surpassed 250,000 exomes sequenced since its creation three years ago—with a vision of sequencing up to double that number.
RGC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Regeneron Pharmaceuticals established in 2014, has increased its sequencing rate since then to 200,000 exomes per year, with plans to ramp up to between 400,000 to 500,000 people a year.
“We were going to do 100,000 in five years, which means that we should have been at 60,000 by now,” recalled George Yancopoulos, M.D., Ph.D., Regeneron co-founder, president, and CSO. “We’re at 250,000, and pretty soon, we’ll be doing 500,000 a year. At our current rate, it would take us 10 years to do 5 million people—at the rate that we’re at pretty much now.”
RGC is on track, he said, to sequence between 5 million and 10 million exomes over 10 years.
“We have line-of-sight on a million in just a few years,” Aris Baras, M.D., VP, co-head, RGC. “We will find a way, we’re going to make it happen. And if it’s on a five or 10-year timeline, or whatever it is, who knows how history will unfold, but we will find a way.”
Drs. Baras and Yancopoulos discussed the RGC’s milestone, its progress in generating genetic data, and what they termed its success in its objective of expanding the use of human genetics for discovering and validating genetic factors that cause or influence a range of diseases where there are major unmet medical needs with reporters at Regeneron’s headquarters in Tarrytown, NY.
“You know how you know that we believe that this is delivering way past all of our expectations We’re doubling our investment in it,” Dr. Yancopoulos said, without quantifying that investment
Regeneron Genetics Center Surpasses 250K Exomes Sequenced, and Ramping Up
