Marlborough Med. Device Firm Hires Thanks To Stimulus
BRANDON BUTLER
Shuqi Chen, left, CEO of IQuum in Marlborough, talks with Gov. Deval Patrick, center, U.S. Rep. James McGovern, right.
Instead of taking a blood sample then waiting hours, or sometimes even days to get the results of a test, a new device produced by IQuum in Marlborough can produce accurate results in less than an hour.
And that product will get to market a little faster thanks to federal stimulus funding, according to IQuum's CEO, Shuqi Chen.
Gov. Deval Patrick and U.S. Rep. James McGovern, D-Worcester, visited IQuum Tuesday and toured the company's 23,000 square-foot facility in the Marlborough Technology Park. Patrick and McGovern made sure to find which of the company's about 55 workers were new hires thanks to a $1 million grant the company received in November.
"This recovery has created jobs, real jobs," Patrick said after touring the facility.
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Shuqi Chen, the company's CEO, said about nine new workers have been hired directly because of funding from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act that was distributed through the National Institute of Health. The new workers will allow for faster product development and therefore swifter approval from the Food & Drug Administration to market the product in the United States as early as this year.
IQuum was founded in the late 1990s by Chen and co-founder Keith Greenfield, now a senior vice president at the company. The company's main product, known as the "Liat Analyzer," can test blood samples for a variety of diseases and viruses.
Chen estimates that 93 percent of doctor's offices and hospitals in the country send their blood work to an offsite location to be analyzed. The Liat Analyzer, which sells for about $25,000 and is about the size of a bedside radio, allows non-specialized workers to conduct blood work tests in about 30 minutes.
The product works by placing a blood sample in one of IQuum's disposable sampling tubes, then placing the tube in the small Liat Analyzer. The analyzer then runs tests and reports results.
"This is really streamlining the whole process of blood work," said McGovern.
The company has benefitted over the past few years from angel funding, government grants and most recently the $1.06 million ARRA grant, which was awarded in November but distributed in January. The stimulus money is aimed specifically at the company developing diagnoses for the H1N1 influenza, which would allow physicians to test for the virus in less than an hour, instead of the couple of hours or days it could take now.
But the Liat Analyzer has a wide variety of alternative applications, Chen said, from testing for HIV, to doing testing on animals and in research.
Chen said if the company gains FDA approval this year IQuum could begin shipping the products this year. He said he already has some customers lined up. With approval and increased manufacturing demand Chen estimates he could add dozens of more jobs this year.
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