A Health and Wellness Play, Poised to Expand
March 15, 2023
Oncocyte: improving patient outcomes through better diagnosis and monitoring
When it comes to cancer treatment, information is key.
The earlier doctors detect the cancer or progression, the earlier they can begin treatment. The more they know about the patient’s specific condition and status, the more targeted and effective their treatment can be.
While there are many companies in this space, none of them give physicians the same level of insight and information that Oncocyte Corporation (Nasdaq: OCX) does with their innovative suite of diagnostic and monitoring technologies.
Oncocyte’s mission is to improve patient outcomes, and they have the technology and the experience to give treating physicians more information, more accurately, faster than ever before.
Cancer treatment can be a matter of life and death. Oncocyte gives physicians the information they need to deliver the right treatment to the right patient.
Oncocyte’s mission is to improve patient outcomes, and the clearer insights and earlier detection their technology provides allows for increased confidence when making important treatment decisions.
Oncocyte’s DetermaRx™ technology has already identified over 500 high risk recurring lung cancer patients, allowing earlier treatment intervention and increasing expected odds of survival by over 90%.
Industry sources estimate this is the size of the cancer diagnosis and treatment market, and Oncocyte is already gaining significant traction with more to come.
With DetermaRx™ already delivering results and revenue, Oncocyte has a full development pipeline of additional tests, services for companies developing new drugs and treatments, and a recent acquisition providing exposure to the lucrative organ transplant testing market.
A cancer diagnosis is a terrible piece of news for a patient to receive, but thanks to Oncocyte (Nasdaq: OCX), physicians are better able to diagnose, monitor, and treat cancer in a more precise, personalized way.
Better information in these cases can improve patient outcomes, and Oncocyte’s technology is already showing promising results.
Launched in 2020, DetermaRx™ is a test that identifies patients with lung cancer who have a high risk of recurrence.
Untreated, nearly 50% of these patients would likely lose their lives within 5 years. Once identified as high risk, these patients are able to receive more appropriate treatment – in some cases chemotherapy – which can increase their survival rate to over 90%.
DetermaRx™ has already identified over 500 high risk patients for recurrence of lung cancer, allowing for prompt treatment and dramatically improved outcomes.
While DetermaRx™ is already delivering results, saving lives, and bringing in revenue, there is much more in the pipeline from Oncocyte.
Available for research only at the moment, DetermaIO™ is a gene expression test to assess the tumor microenvironment to predict response to immunotherapies. DetermaTx, currently in development, will assess mutational status of a tumor.
Also in development are DetermaCNI™, a blood based monitoring test, and DetermaMX™, a long-term recurrence monitoring test.
Cancer diagnosis and treatment is a very technical field, and the bottom line is that Oncocyte’s tests will give attending physicians more information at critical decision points on the condition of the patients and the progression or remission of their cancer.
When treating patients, information is power. So it follows that a technology like DetermaRx™ that provides more information and clearer insights would be an obvious decision for doctors to use in their practice.
Oncocyte’s experience has shown this to be true, so one of the biggest opportunities for the company right now is educating more doctors about the benefits of this product, and onboarding them to use it in their practice.
This is an area that Oncocyte has already seen considerable progress in, increasing the pool of prescribing physicians by 22% between Q2 and Q3 2021, 150% year over year, to a total of 367.
In the same time period, onboarded hospitals and sites increased 24% to a total of 218 sites. This was a 225% increase year over year.
Oncocyte has seen repeat prescriptions from onboarded doctors and sites, indicating that they are finding the tests valuable in the treatment of their patients. As more products become available, Oncocyte will continue their education efforts and hopefully see significant further growth.
Even though several of their tests are still in development, DetermaRx™ continues to generate revenue growth for Oncocyte. In Q3 2021 alone, revenues were approximately $1 million, a 77% increase year over year.
For the period of Q1 to Q3 2021, revenue was $4.1 million, a massive 480% increase year over year.
With more products coming online, more physicians and hospitals being onboarded, and repeat orders coming in, we are optimistic about the future for Oncocyte.
Oncocyte Corporation recently announced a development and co-marketing agreement for two distributed in vitro diagnostic (IVD) assays on Thermo Fisher Scientific’s Ion Torrent™ Genexus™ System. Oncocyte has also been granted rights to develop future companion diagnostics on the Genexus System. This represents a huge opportunity to expand access to precision oncology.
“As many as 44% of newly diagnosed cancer patients may be eligible for immuno-oncology therapies, with additional patients potentially benefiting from other precision medicines, yet many patients’ tumors are never sequenced to determine if they may benefit from these targeted treatments,” said Ron Andrews, President and Chief Executive Officer of Oncocyte. “In order to increase the number of patients benefiting from precision medicine, we need to expand the number of IVDs and develop these tests on instruments that are designed to make sequencing-based testing simple and more accessible.”
Mr. Andrews continued, “Leveraging Thermo Fisher’s proven global capabilities and installed base will enable us to expand the availability of IVD assays beyond the U.S. market, (and the collaboration) will play a key role in helping us improve patient outcomes worldwide.”
Supported by the first-of-its-kind Genexus System – which is easier to use, and delivers same-day results in the right conditions – Oncocyte’s collaboration lays the groundwork for rapid expansion into new markets while delivering better diagnostics to patients around the world.
The diagnosis and monitoring of cancer is critical for improving patient outcomes, but treatment, of course, is a key piece of the puzzle.
Oncocyte pharmaceutical services division provides a full suite of molecular testing services to companies developing new cancer treatments and drugs. This line of business represents another significant potential stream of revenue, and further supports Oncocyte’s mission of improving patient outcomes.
Oncocyte is a precision diagnostics company with the mission to improve patient outcomes by providing clear insights that inform critical decisions in the diagnosis, treatment, and monitoring of cancer.
With clinical success and increasing revenues, the Company’s DetermaRx™ diagnostic test is already gaining significant support and traction among physicians and hospitals.
Oncocyte has multiple promising cancer diagnostic and research tests in the pipeline, and through a recent acquisition, has exposure to the lucrative $2 billion organ transplant testing market.
With an experienced team and proven science already producing cutting edge diagnostic technology, the future for Oncocyte is looking bright.
Oncocyte’s mission is to improve patient outcomes, and they are already well on their way to doing exactly that. For investors, a position in Oncocyte could be a very profitable way to gain exposure to the booming medical testing market through a proven innovator in the space.
President and CEO
Ronnie has over 35 years of experience in the Global Clinical and Molecular Diagnostics industry. He currently serves as the President and CEO of Oncocyte Inc. In his early years in diagnostics, he worked for Abbott Diagnostics in sales and marketing, Immucor as VP of Marketing and Product Development, and the SVP Operations for Roche Molecular Diagnostics.
Chief Financial Officer
Mitch joined Oncocyte Corp as Chief Financial Officer in November of 2017 and is responsible for all aspects of financial management and corporate reporting, and is one the most experienced executives globally in capital markets.
Chief Operating Officer
Gisela was appointed Chief Operating Officer of Oncocyte Corporation in October 2021, and brings with her over two decades of experience as a cross-functional leader, with an extensive scientific and operational background leading large-scale global change management and driving commercial and drug development innovation at global pharmaceutical and diagnostics companies.
Chief Science Officer
Prior to joining Oncocyte, Dr. Doug Ross was a founding principal in the Bethesda Group, LLC, a boutique consulting firm that provided technical, commercial and operational expertise to the diagnostic and pharma industry. He is an experienced medical diagnostics R&D executive with a background in research and development at the intersections between genomics, proteomics and diagnostics.
Chief Commercial Officer
Padma has extensive experience in commercializing and driving market leadership for molecular diagnostics at Roche Sequencing, Guardant Health, and Affymetrix.
Chief Technology Officer
Ekkehard (Ekke) joined Oncocyte in April 2021 through the acquisition of Chronix Biomedical. Ekke serves as the managing director of Chronix Biomedical GmbH, wholly owned by Oncocyte and CMO for Europe. As an adjunct professor, he teaches molecular genetics and diagnostics at the Georg-August-University.