Year: 2005-06

Company: Beckman Coulter

Liaison(s): Camille Johnson, Bonnie Anderson

HbA1c is a variant of hemoglobin that contains bound glucose. Since the dissociation of glucose from hemoglobin is very slow, HbA1c is present in a red blood cell (RBC) throughout the cell’s lifetime of 90 to 120 days. The amount of HbA1c in an individual’s RBCs may be used as a measure of the average blood glucose level during a period of several weeks preceding the blood test. For diabetics, HbA1c levels provide a good assessment of whether their diabetes is under control. The goal of this project was to develop a commercialization strategy for an innovative screening and monitoring test that measures HbA1c content per cell by discriminating among RBCs of different ages to assess mean glucose levels throughout the RBC life span. The team focused on market research and development, and market penetration and segmentation strategies including collection of primary and secondary data/information on HbA1c diagnostics and current pipeline of diabetes drugs/ therapies to develop viable scenarios to facilitate the most effective means of commercializing the product.