Cepheid, Oxford Nanopore Proceed With Infectious Disease Research Partnership

The companies will build on their sepsis testing workflow to include antimicrobial resistance profiling and genomic antibiotic susceptibility testing.

Cepheid and Oxford Nanopore Technologies (ONT) announced April 15 an expansion of their collaboration to develop a workflow for rapid bacterial and fungal pathogen identification, following a successful first phase of their partnership.

Announced in 2025, the partnership began with a workflow to profile bacterial and fungal pathogens from culture isolates for sepsis and bloodstream infection research. Phase two will extend the workflow’s capabilities to include pathogen identification, antimicrobial resistance profiling, and genomic antibiotic susceptibility testing predictions for bloodstream infection and sepsis research, performed using both culture isolates and positive blood cultures.

The updated workflow will add user-friendly design elements and will be made available through a co-commercialized research-use-only launch. The companies said they expect to launch an early access program by the third quarter. Financial and other details of the collaboration were not disclosed.

The workflow pairs Cepheid’s GeneXpert platform with ONT’s sequencing technology. The companies said they share a longer-term goal of developing an in vitro diagnostic solution.

Early user feedback from the first phase helped make the case for expanding the program, according to ONT CEO Francis Van Parys. “We have ambitions of a future where ONT sequencing can enable insights when and where they are needed for complex infections,” he said in a statement.