Genoptix listened to the market to hone its products

Genoptix, Inc. might be considered a rarity in today’s troubled biotech landscape - it makes money everyday, according to CEO Tina Nova, who left the now-bankrupt Nanogen to co-found Genoptix in 1999.

The specialized laboratory service provider capitalizes on a niche market — delivering personalized and comprehensive diagnostic services to community-based hematologists (who diagnose and treat blood disorders) and oncologists.

The Carlsbad company diagnoses cancers of the blood, such as leukemia and lymphoma, from bone marrow and blood samples shipped to them from 1,200 physicians across 47 states. Its key service offerings are COMPASS, short for Comprehensive Assessment - a unique analysis of the multiple tests performed on a sample and tracked by one hemopathologist — and CHART, short for Comprehensive Hematopathology Assessment and Review Over Time, which combines multiple COMPASS reports automatically as physicians monitor the progress of the disease and how the patient responds to treatment.

Physicians on site

Physicians are on site and available to discuss the final diagnosis with the client, so that the community hematologist and/or oncologist can determine how best to treat the patient.

“Our clients can receive all the tests they need from us,” said Nova. “Rather than getting one test done at this lab and one at another lab, and then having to analyze the tests from different sources. The community docs were getting very frustrated with that type of system because it made it difficult for them to provide a timely diagnosis and determine appropriate treatment.”

Profitable in three years

Genoptix began selling its services in 2004 with 50 employees and has been turning a profit since the first quarter of 2007. It completed its IPO offering in November of 2007 and reported revenues of $59.3 million, $24.0 million, $5.2 million, $0.7 million and $0.2 million in 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004 and 2003, respectively, making it a shoe-in for being named the fastest growing company in San Diego in 2008 by Deloitte’s Technology Fast 50 Program.

The organization achieved revenue growth from 2003 to 2007 of more than 288 percent.

As of March 31, the latest quarter-end date, the organization had 329 full-time employees, including 62 sales representatives and 26 hematopathologists, pathologists who are trained to recognize diseases of the blood.

To accommodate its growth, the company expanded its laboratory space by approximately 75 percent last year and now has more than 100,000 square feet of combined laboratory and office space.

Filling a market need

Nova credited the company’s success to its business model, which is based on fulfilling an unmet need.

“We listened to what the clinical need was,” she said. “The community hematologists and oncologists told us what they needed, and we listened. Because of what we heard from our customers, we developed the business model that fit the clinical need, rather than the other way around. We give them the final diagnosis — not just random test results. And that’s what makes us very different from the competition.”

Once the lab has multiple samples from a patient, Genoptix provides not only the current lab results, but the diagnosis that was made prior to that, so the patient’s physician can track progression over time.

“Certainly, no other company is doing that,” said Nova.

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Shannon Rose Strybel is a freelance writer based in San Diego.

Tags: SDNN

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