Caliper Life Sciences Stays on Hold

Caliper Life Sciences (CALP - Analyst Report) recently launched the Staccato Protein workstation for automated protein sample preparation and analysis. Automation, Consulting, Engineering, and Services (ACES) division of the company has developed this workstation to particularly deal with the challenges that arise during the characterization of biological therapeutics and biogenerics.

The workstation contains LabChip GXII for microfluidic protein characterization. The LabChip GXII analyzes the protein size, concentration, and purity and serves as a substitute for traditional polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has asked drug producers to file applications for new biological drug in compliance with quality by design (QbD) requirements. QbD parameters call for multivariate testing procedures that produce large numbers of samples and pose several challenges in the process of sample preparation and analysis.

The Staccato Protein workstation – featuring customized automated solutions for integrating sample preparation and analysis – is well equipped to handle these challenges. The QbD framework ensures the quality of therapeutic proteins and monoclonal antibodies and creates norms for sanctioning the follow-on protein products.

Caliper closed at $1.59 on Monday. We continue to maintain our Hold recommendation for the company.