Demand for quick and accurate high throughput sequencing has never been greater. According to a recent Frost and Sullivan market analysis, Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) services will grow at an annual compound rate of 28% from 2011 to 2016. Based on this estimate, we should expect a double digit increase in the number of service providers entering the marketplace each year. Such growth will exacerbate current challenges in efficiently accessing and utilizing NGS resources, including the lack of an effective interface for customers and service providers to work with each other. After several years of working in this industry, we’re pleased to launch Genohub, an online sequencing marketplace, to address this and several other industry issues:

Discoverability and Accessibility

With over 5 commercial sequencing platforms, 3 times that number of sequencing instruments, numerous read type combinations and more than 20 different library preparation methods, conveying information to sequencing clients can be a formidable task, one that will only become harder as new sequencing technology and library prep methods are introduced. Additionally, non-standard service descriptions, prices and deliverables make it difficult for customers to decide whether a particular sequencing facility can handle their samples. While this may not be a problem for facilities that deal with just a handful of repeat clients, it prevents services from being easily discovered and accessed by a much larger number of prospective customers. Genohub solves this problem by allowing service providers to efficiently and precisely advertise NGS services in a format that’s easy to sort, filter and search. Our software automatically offers services to customers based on their experimental needs. In doing so, we’re providing the infrastructure to make sequencing services more accessible to the larger sequencing market.

Ordering

We know that spending time writing quotes for customers who are comparing prices is tedious and frustrating. Genohub allows customers to compare and order services immediately, review provider-specific instructions, enter details of their experiment and place the order right there on the site. This not only saves time, but also allows providers instant access to a large NGS customer base. By the way, service providers always have the option not to accept a customer’s order. Genohub provides both the marketplace and the freedom to make final risk-free decisions on all orders.

Project Communication

The provider and customer typically need to communicate with one another at multiple points over the course of a project. This includes the provider requesting more information from the customer about the order, communicating unforeseen handling or quality issues with the customer’s samples, communicating the order status, etc. Genohub streamlines these interactions with a provider/customer interface that allows open and documented communication, along with the ability to update order status. We’ve developed “single-click” order updates for service providers to easily convey information to NGS customers who would otherwise inquire several times by phone or email.

Join us! During public beta, we are inviting NGS service providers to join our site, list their services and take orders. See our overview page for a quick description of how the site works or go straight to sign up. As always, please don’t hesitate to contact us with questions at support@genohub.com.