>Infinite scale, infinite profits! You just can't beat it!
Robert, also the infinite convenience. Before the internet I would have to fly to say New York... to demo our software.
Now, I can sit in the comfort of my office. Have the potential customer go to our web-site, I do the same, and in less than a 1/2 hr the customer can see exactly what we have. And neither of us had to leave our office.
No travel, no hotels, no stress.
Hey, I love the Internet. Trust me.
Ps
Oh!
>February 18, 2000
Shares of Sequenom jumped 13 percent yesterday on news that the San Diego company announced a sale to the National Institutes of Health, and on the overall strength of the soaring biotech sector.
Sequenom, whose stock has more than quadrupled since an initial public offering two weeks ago, said it sold NIH two components of its MassArray system for spotting genetic variations in large numbers of gene samples.
Nearly every other biotech stock also rose, many by 10 percent or more, as investors continue to move into the sector and bet that biotech stocks will surge the way Internet stocks have in recent years.
"I think we're in the early stages of a long-term rally," said analyst Charles Engelberg of AmeriCal Securities. "The market is ruled by momentum players, and everybody has figured out that biotech is the place to be."
Four San Diego biotechs registered gains of at least 40 percent yesterday, and a dozen of the roughly 30 local biotechs that trade on major exchanges closed at all-time highs.
That included Sequenom and Diversa, a biotech that went public earlier this week and also has more than quadrupled in value. Diversa reported no news and declined to comment on its stock's 41 percent jump.
Shares of Immune Response, a Carlsbad company whose shares plunged last year, rebounded 42 percent after the company said its scientists synthesized a gene that that might be useful in treating hemophilia.
And shares of Trega Biosciences, a company that presented at the Biotechnology Industry Organization investor conference in New York this week, jumped 48 percent, while shares of Epimmune jumped 42 percent.
Neither company released any news yesterday.
For Sequenom, the deal with NIH represents the first sale the company has made since the commercial launch of the MassArray system, the complete version of which sells for $400,000 or more.
Six research organizations including NIH have been testing the system, Sequenom's first product, which is different from current systems because it measures the molecular weight of DNA samples to delineate genetic differences.
Sequenom thinks this approach will be faster and cheaper than traditional methods, thus making possible new approaches both in research and in diagnosing and treating disease.
The components NIH bought will allow it to prepare microscopic volumes of genetic material for testing in a system NIH already has. The components will be installed in a lab at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.
Sequenom shares, which trade under the ticker SQNM, closed up $13.50 at $117.50 after rising as high as $129 during the day.
In recent days, gains in the sector have been widespread, pushing up shares in all but 10 of the 200 companies in the Nasdaq Biotech Index this year.
More than half the stocks included in that index have at least doubled in just the past seven weeks. Yesterday, 169 members of the biotech index rose, while 27 fell and four were unchanged.
All San Diego biotechs that trade on major exchanges have gained in value since the beginning of 2000. |
