Qiagen and Illumina just made a huge commitment to one another. The two companies announced a 15-year partnership to broaden the availability and use of NGS-based in-vitro diagnostic kits, including companion diagnostics, for patient management.

Initially, the partnership will focus on commercializing oncology IVD kits to support patient management.

The agreement grants Hilden, Germany-based Qiagen non-exclusive rights to develop and globally commercialize IVD kits to be used together with Illumina’s MiSeq Dx and NextSeq 550Dx Systems.

The agreement also includes rights for expansion of the partnership on future Illumina diagnostic systems. Both partners are also exploring opportunities for Qiagen to develop and market companion diagnostics based on San Diego-based Illumina’s TruSight Oncology (TSO) assays that enable comprehensive genomic profiling of tumor samples in immunotherapy.

Illumina and Qiagen will cooperate to commercialize a menu of clinically validated workflows that combine Qiagen’s proprietary content and bioinformatics solutions.

In the future, the collaboration could expand to include additional clinical diagnostic fields, such as cardiology, hereditary diseases, infectious diseases, as well as inflammatory and autoimmune diseases.

“We are committed to expanding the range of clinical use cases addressed by genomic sequencing by enabling partners to deliver IVD tests and companion diagnostics on Illumina’s Dx instruments,” Francis deSouza, CEO of Illumina, said in a release. “Our partnership with Qiagen will complement Illumina’s TSO 500 family with additional testing menu options, accelerating NGS adoption in oncology patient management.”

“Bringing together our highly complementary capabilities marks an important milestone to advance the use of NGS technologies in clinical decision-making and our shared vision of using this powerful technology to improve the outcomes for patients worldwide,” Peer Schatz, CEO of Qiagen, said in a release.

Qiagen also announced that Schatz would be stepping down as CEO and transitioning to the role of a special advisor to the company’s supervisory board.

He took the helm of Qiagen back in 2004 and has been with the firm for 27 years. Thierry Bernard, senior VP, Head of Molecular Diagnostics Business Area for Qiagen, will now act as interim CEO and work in tandem with Roland Sackers, CFO until a permanent replacement for Schatz can be found.