Biological Detection, Inc. and Carl Zeiss Yena, GmbH of Germany form worldwide strategic alliance in drug discovery.

PITTSBURGH--(HealthWire)--Sept. 25, 1996--Biological Detection, Inc. (BDI) and Carl Zeiss Yena, GmbH announced today a world-wide strategic alliance to develop and market high precision and high throughput systems for cell-based drug discovery. As an integral part of the strategic alliance, Carl Zeiss, Inc. (the group's American subsidiary) has made an equity investment in BDI and Mr. James A. Sharp, head of worldwide microscope operations of Zeiss, has been elected to the BDI board of directors.

"The combined strengths of BDI and Zeiss will enable BDI to deliver the most powerful, complete systems for cell-based drug discovery to the pharmaceutical industry," said John M. Boles, Chairman of Biological Detection, Inc. "Carl Zeiss is acknowledged as the world leader in optical and mechanical systems and Biological Detection Inc. is recognized as a leader in multi-color fluorescence analyses and bioinformatics."

The first product developed by the alliance is ArrayScan(TM), a fully-automated system for rapidly screening arrays of cells prepared in microplate formats. ArrayScan provides a method for performing quantitative, multicolor fluorescence and morphological measurements on multiple cells labeled with multiple fluorescent probes in each well of a microplate. The ArrayScan system is driven by powerful analysis and bioinformatics software. ArrayScan is the first system to allow for multiple, high precision, molecular and biochemical effects of compounds to be measured at the cellular level in the drug discovery process. BDI and Zeiss are also developing the next generation of miniaturized tools for cell-based drug discovery.

"Carl Zeiss is making a major investment in developing both today's technologies and the next generation screening systems for drug discovery," stated Peter Grassmann, chairman of Carl Zeiss. "Carl Zeiss already has a major presence in the basic research laboratories of pharmaceutical companies and this is the next logical step. We look forward to a valuable alliance with Biological Detection, Inc."

CONTACT: Biological Detection, Inc., Pittsburgh

Karen Skurcenski, 412/826-3857