Foundation Medicine, Inc. is an American company based in

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As part of the Boston metropolitan area, the cities population of the 2020 U.S. census was 118,403, making it the fourth most populous city in the state, behind Boston, ...

, which develops, manufactures, and sells genomic profiling

assays An assay is an investigative (analytic) procedure in laboratory medicine, mining, pharmacology, environmental biology and molecular biology for qualitatively assessing or quantitatively measuring the presence, amount, or functional activity of a ...

based on

next-generation sequencing Massive parallel sequencing or massively parallel sequencing is any of several high-throughput approaches to DNA sequencing using the concept of massively parallel processing; it is also called next-generation sequencing (NGS) or second-generation s ...

technology for

solid tumors A neoplasm () is a type of abnormal and excessive growth of tissue. The process that occurs to form or produce a neoplasm is called neoplasia. The growth of a neoplasm is uncoordinated with that of the normal surrounding tissue, and persists ...

hematologic malignancies Tumors of the hematopoietic and lymphoid tissues (American English) or tumours of the haematopoietic and lymphoid tissues (British English) are tumors that affect the blood, bone marrow, lymph, and lymphatic system. Because these tissues are all ...

, and

sarcoma A sarcoma is a malignant tumor, a type of cancer that arises from transformed cells of mesenchymal (connective tissue) origin. Connective tissue is a broad term that includes bone, cartilage, fat, vascular, or hematopoietic tissues, and sarcom ...

History

Foundation Medicine was founded in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The company was conceived after

Broad Institute The Eli and Edythe L. Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard (IPA: , pronunciation respelling: ), often referred to as the Broad Institute, is a biomedical and genomic research center located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Cambridge, Massachusetts, U ...

researchers Levi Garraway and Matthew Meyerson published a 2007 paper detailing a method for large-panel testing of 238 DNA

mutation In biology, a mutation is an alteration in the nucleic acid sequence of the genome of an organism, virus, or extrachromosomal DNA. Viral genomes contain either DNA or RNA. Mutations result from errors during DNA or viral replication, mi ...

s. Foundation Medicine launched in 2010 with a $25 million Series A financing led by

Third Rock Ventures Third Rock Ventures is a venture capital firm based in Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of ...

. The company released its first commercial assay, or test, called FoundationOne in 2012. The company also began partnering with pharmaceutical companies to analyze patient samples. The first such program was piloted with

Novartis Novartis AG is a Swiss-American multinational pharmaceutical corporation based in Basel, Switzerland and Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States (global research).name="novartis.com">https://www.novartis.com/research-development/research-loc ...

in 2011, and by 2018, the company had more than 30 partnerships. Foundation Medicine launched its second test, a

hematological Hematology ( always spelled haematology in British English) is the branch of medicine concerned with the study of the cause, prognosis, treatment, and prevention of diseases related to blood. It involves treating diseases that affect the produc ...

biomarker In biomedical contexts, a biomarker, or biological marker, is a measurable indicator of some biological state or condition. Biomarkers are often measured and evaluated using blood, urine, or soft tissues to examine normal biological processes, ...

assay called FoundationOneHeme, in 2013. The company held its initial public offering in August 2013. The following year, Priority Health in Michigan became the first healthcare plan in the United States to cover the company's tests. In 2016, using FoundationCore data, Foundation Medicine released anonymized records detailing genomic data on cancers from 18,000 adult patients to the

National Cancer Institute The National Cancer Institute (NCI) coordinates the United States National Cancer Program and is part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which is one of eleven agencies that are part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. ...

's (NCI) Genomic Data Commons (GDC) portal. In June 2018, Roche announced it would acquire Foundation Medicine. Foundation Medicine is now a subsidiary of Roche and It operates independently.

Products

Foundation Medicine's products include genomic tests used to test solid tumors and blood-based cancers and sarcomas, as well as data services. *FoundationOne CDx is a CGP test providing information for five tumor types: ovarian, lung, breast, colorectal, and melanoma. *FoundationOne Liquid *FoundationOne Heme *The company's FoundationCore database contains more than 300,000 genomic profiles sourced from the results of the company's assays as well as information on over 150 subtypes of cancer.

References

External links

* {{official website, www.foundationmedicine.com Roche Biotechnology companies of the United States Companies based in Cambridge, Massachusetts Companies formerly listed on the Nasdaq Genomics companies Health care companies based in Massachusetts