Celera Statement on the Policy Statement of President Clinton and Prime Minister Blair on the Availability of Genomic Information
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ROCKVILLE, Md.--(BW HealthWire)--March 14, 2000--The following is
a statement issued today by Celera Genomics and includes a letter from
J. Craig Venter, Ph.D., President and Chief Scientific Officer, Celera
Genomics.
Celera Genomics welcomes the statement. Its own mission is
completely consistent with the goals of assuring that the world's
researchers have access to this important information to enable
advances and discoveries that will improve the human condition.
Since the announcement of Celera's formation we have made a clear
commitment that upon our completion of the consensus human genome we
would publish it in a peer-reviewed scientific journal and make it
available to researchers for free.
Background and Overview
Celera is in the business of discovering and disseminating
valuable scientific information, not withholding, delaying, or
politicizing such. This position statement is intended as a
straightforward record of our business and our goals. Celera considers
itself to be a classic example of an American entrepreneur. It is a
purely private venture that does not look for, or depend upon, public
subsidy or support. Exclusively funded by the capital put at risk by
its investors, Celera unabashedly looks to reward those risks, advance
science, and ultimately better the human condition.
History and Progress to Date
In 1986, the federally sponsored human genome project was
initiated with a goal of sequencing the human genome. Over $2 Billion
of public funding has been spent to date in this effort. Prior to
Celera's creation, 2005 was established as a target completion date
for this effort. This timetable and the associated budgetary
requirements were far from certain.
Celera was created in May 1998, by PE Corporation and
Dr. J. Craig Venter. It was financed exclusively by its shareholders.
Celera's ambitious goal was to sequence the human genome far more
quickly and inexpensively (approximately one-tenth the cost) than the
public effort using technologies developed by PE Biosystems and a
strategy developed by Dr. Venter and other Celera scientists. Celera
quickly gained momentum and has exceeded even its ambitious goals.
The sequencing phase of Drosophila has been completed and will be
published in the journal Science March 24, 2000. All of the data will
be published and freely available. The Drosophila genome is the
largest genome sequenced and published in history and was the result
of an excellent collaboration between Celera and the Berkeley
Drosophila Genome Project. Our completion of human sequencing is
anticipated during 2000.
There is little question that Celera's bold initiatives also have
contributed to a quantum leap in the activities and accomplishments of
others in this arena, such that the world is far closer to genomics
revolutionizing medicine and healthcare. Unlike many others in this
arena, Celera has not sought government funding, nor has it asked for
preferential non-profit tax treatment. Celera is a tracking stock
business unit of PE Corporation (NYSE:CRA), and is 100% owned by its
shareholders. It is primarily located in Rockville, and continues to
grow rapidly from its current employee base of over 500.
Celera's Mission
Celera's mission is to discover, assemble, annotate, and broadly
disseminate genomic and related information. Some have said that
Celera intends to "lock-up" or "monopolize" genomic information. That
couldn't be farther from the truth. Consistent with PE Corporation's
overall culture and philosophy, Celera's technology and information is
intended to be shared with the world. Celera's business model is not
based on withholding information, or extorting exorbitant fees, from
academic or commercial research users.
Celera's business model is that of an information company
providing researchers in academia and industry the genomic
information, software tools and powerful computers for analysis, and
annotation of the genomic data to enable their scientific advances and
discoveries. Subscribers to our databases and software tools will be
free to make discoveries, publish their results, and develop whatever
intellectual property protections they desire for their results.
Data Release Policy
We believe our company to be somewhat unique in anticipating
information releases to researchers for little or no cost. For
example, we made the entire genetic code of the fruit fly, Drosophila,
available to world for free in 1999. A consistent part of our business
model has been we will release the entire consensus human genome
freely to researchers on Celera's Internet site. We believe that this
is in the best interests of both science and our company, since it
will allow researchers to advance science and medicine and at the same
time be introduced to Celera's high quality data and software tools.
The following letter was released by Celera on March 7, 2000
Francis Collins, M.D., Ph.D.
Martin Bobrow
Robert H. Waterston, M.D., Ph.D.
Harold Varmus, M.D.
National Institutes of Health
National Human Genome Research Institute
31 Center Drive MSC 2152
Building 31, Room 4B09
Bethesda, MD 20892-2152
Dear Francis, Robert, Martin, and Harold:
I am responding to your letter of February 28, 2000. A
preliminary question involves your current motivations. While I would
like to believe that the purpose for your letter involves furthering
good faith efforts toward collaboration, various aspects of the letter
indicate the opposite. It presents a one-week ultimatum, reflecting an
apparent disregard for the fact that, as my office informed you, I
have been entirely unavailable travelling during the past few weeks
(the exception being the one day I was in Washington during that
period when you were unable to meet with me). While I do not
understand the need for your deadline, Celera has no interest in
obstructing or delaying the public effort.
I am also concerned by the implications of the release of your
letter to the press prior to my return and response. This obviously
conflicts with what I thought we both agreed would be important to
reaching agreement in this complex area -- avoiding public posturing
and contention. While Celera has no issue with publicly standing
behind its position, I trust you anticipated the consequences of
releasing to the press your selective perspectives on our discussions.
If you disfavor collaboration, a simple "no thank you" will suffice.
Speaking for Celera, we continue to be interested in pursuing
good faith discussions toward collaboration. Assuming that there is a
reciprocal interest in good faith discussions and given the recent
misinformation, let me reiterate Celera's consistent position.
As documented in the June 5, 1998 issue of Science, Celera's goal
is to both discover and broadly disseminate the human genome sequence.
Given the costs and value of this effort, we attempted to clarify a
dissemination model that is fair and reasonable. Particularly for pure
research applications, we foresee information being released at little
or no cost to the end user. For those looking to use our information
to their financial benefit, we are unapologetic in seeking a
reasonable return for our efforts. At the same time, and as
distinguished from the business models of many of our competitors, we
anticipate broadly disseminating information without the inherent
deterrent of requiring database users to pay onerous royalties on the
discoveries they make with our data (often referred to as
"reach-through" royalties). We have already entered into several
third-party agreements that bind us to this. We will continue to react
unfavorably to claims that Celera's intends to withhold information
and delay progress, particularly when our fundamental mission is to
accelerate the dissemination of information.
As you know, our meeting with you on December 29, 1999 grew out
of a series of discussions with Eric Lander of the Whitehead
Institute. These discussions produced some reasonable goals and the
potential basis of a sound agreement. Unfortunately, Dr. Lander was
not a member of your negotiating team and the scope of the December 29
meeting changed dramatically. Much of the discussion was based on
hypothetical scenarios that had little to do with the earlier
discussions. As a result, a number of points in your letter
dramatically misstated Celera's position. For example, your discussion
of our needs for intellectual property protection is quite distorted.
We stated a need for data protection in response to your assertion
that your researchers should have total access to all of Celera's data
at their laboratories, including our electrophoretic files. These data
are of significant commercial importance and we naturally responded
that we would need sufficient protection for them. You have now
asserted that Celera's intellectual property protections made in
response to your requirement are inhibitions to the collaboration.
Our collaboration with Dr. Gerald Rubin of Berkeley on the
Drosophila genome has been a model that has been remarkably
productive. The terms of that agreement were reviewed and approved by
Dr. Collins, Dr. Varmus, and representatives of the Wellcome Trust.
Despite your recent actions we remain hopeful that collaboration on
similar terms can be achieved for the human genome.
*T
Let me restate Celera's position on the terms of collaboration:
-- As with the Drosophila genome, Celera will assemble the human
genome with its own data. Public data will be used for
comparative purposes. As demonstrated with Drosophila, excellent
assembly was achieved without the public rough draft data.
However, Celera is prepared to assemble a consensus human genome
using its data and the data produced by the public human genome
project. As with the Drosophila genome, scientists from the
public sequencing labs would be welcome to come to Celera and
verify these data and to analyze the resulting genome.
-- As with the Drosophila genome, joint publications would be
produced describing the finished human genome.
-- The finished genome consensus sequence would be available to all
researchers. We believe a web-based version at Celera's site is
an appropriate balance between an open distribution and a
protection of our commercial interests. We have also discussed a
DVD version and we are open to that option.
-- Researchers would be free to use the published data in their
research at no cost.
-- The only restriction that Celera has ever requested is that other
database providers would be prohibited from providing or selling
Celera's data as their own. We certainly agree that if the public
project wanted to publish a version of the genome that did not
depend in any way on Celera data we would have no objection to
your distribution of those data.
While it is not our preference to negotiate this collaboration
through the media, we feel compelled to release this letter to the
media in order to correct the misconceptions created by your released
letter.
We believe that speed is essential for completing the genome. Its
completion is the beginning of a new era in medicine that many lives
depend on. The research that follows is far more important than
squabbles over credit for its completion. Our consistent goal has been
to pursue alternatives that will benefit science and the public while
at the same time fulfilling our obligations to our shareholders and
fairly rewarding them for their investment.
Sincerely,
J. Craig Venter, Ph.D.
President
*T
CONTACT: Celera
Heather Kowalski, 240/453-3343
KEYWORD: MARYLAND
INDUSTRY KEYWORD: BIOTECHNOLOGY GOVERNMENT MEDICAL
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