Qiagen

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QIAGEN (NASDAQ: QGEN, FWB:QIA) sells technologies and products for preanalytical sample preparation and molecular diagnostic solutions. Founded in 1984, QIAGEN N.V. today is a Dutch holding company with operational headquarters in Hilden, Germany. It has subsidiaries in 14 countries and employs more than 1700 people worldwide.

QIAGEN is best known for products involved in DNA and RNA purification. In biotechnology and the biological sciences it is often necessary to purify specific molecules such as nucleid acids (DNA and RNA), from other cell components. In the early 1980s, Metin Colpan, then a doctorate student, developed a new advanced procedure for the separation of nucleic acids, which was easier and faster to use than existing methods. Colpan’s idea was to market his discovery in a single company and with two friends he founded QIAGEN, one of the first German Biotech firms.

Today the company sells more than 500 consumable products and automated solutions for a broad range of life science research, including the handling, separation and purification of proteins. QIAGEN also provides diagnostic kits, tests and assays for human and veterinary molecular diagnostics. For example, the company has launched highly specific tests which allow for effective and rapid detection of the avian flu virus H5N1.

The products are sold in over 42 countries around the world to academic research markets, to leading pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies as well as to diagnostics laboratories. QIAGEN also supplies standardized purification and testing solutions to applied testing markets such as forensics, biodefense, food testing, and pharmaceutical process control.

QIAGEN is well-known throughout the industry for having easy to use kits that replace older, more laborious and time intensive methods.

QIAGEN often does not disclose the chemical content of its buffers, which can be inconvenient for researches who may not want to include QIAGEN as part of their published papers.

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