AstraZeneca undertakes three new partnerships for technological investment in UK site

20 November 2015

Anglo-Swedish drug company AstraZeneca (LSE: AZN) has announced three new partnerships to delivery technologies that will drive the AstraZeneca MRC UK Centre for Lead Discovery in Cambridge, UK.

The first partnership is with HighRes Biosolution, a provider of automated robotic systems for the life sciences industry. The company will develop robots for the high throughput screening of compounds, which will use technology originally developed for the European Space Agency. These robots are particularly useful since scientists can interact with them directly rather than being separated from them by a protective shield. This will make AstraZeneca the first adopter of this advanced robotics in the pharma industry.

The second partnership is to use the energy of sound waves to dispense compounds directly from individual storage tubes into well plates for testing, comprising fully-automated liquid handling by Labcyte, automated liquid storage systems by Brooks Automation and a co-developed acoustic sample storage tube.

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