Sony and Cellares announced a joint development collaboration Sept. 12.

The two companies say the partnership aims to integrate Sony’s cell-sorting and analytical technologies into the Cell Shuttle, Cellares‘ automated cell therapy manufacturing platform.

The announcement comes on the heels of Cellares commissioning the first Cell Shuttle at its Smart Factory in Bridgewater, as NJBIZ reported.

Cellares is the world’s first Integrated Development and Manufacturing Organization (IDMO) – and its Cell Shuttle represents a leap forward in cell therapy manufacturing, with integration and automation providing unprecedented scale with the ability to manufacture 16 cell therapy batches in parallel while reducing batch price by up to 50% and reducing opportunities for contamination and operational error.

The partnership will leverage technologies from Sony’s CGX10 Cell Isolation System to develop new solutions and capabilities.

The two companies believe the combination of its industry-leading technologies will make the Cell Shuttle the world’s first truly automated, end-to-end cell therapy manufacturing solution with cell analysis and sorting capabilities. They say it will also strengthen the Cell Shuttle technology platform and its position as it aims to be the de-facto new standard for clinical and commercial scale cell therapy manufacturing for the majority of cell modalities.

‘Unprecedented scale’

“Sony’s CGX10 is used by companies developing various types of cell therapies, for which sorting is a critical step of the manufacturing process,” said Katsunori Ogawa, head of the Life Science & Technology Business Unit at Sony Corp. “Incorporating high-performance cell analysis and sorting capabilities in an end-to-end automated process paves the way for scaling up the manufacturing of those therapies.”

Ogawa said the Cell Shuttle manufacturing platform is an ideal integration use case for Sony’s flow cytometry-based analysis and sorting technology.

“Helping both Sony and Cellares offer unprecedented scale to anyone developing the next wave of innovative cell therapies,” Ogawa continued. “At Sony, we strongly believe that such collaborations are key to providing the best technology to the industry and ultimately have a meaningful impact in health care.”

Cellares CEO and co-founder Fabian Gerlinghaus said, “Sony’s technology will integrate seamlessly and provide throughput and full automation for manufacturing workflows requiring cell analysis and sorting.”

“The Cell Shuttle allows our clients to meet the total global patient demand for their cell therapies, and by incorporating high throughput cell analysis and sorting into the Cell Shuttle, we are extending Cellares’ automated manufacturing capabilities to meet the needs of even more cell therapy developers,” said Gerlinghaus. “We are pleased to work together with Sony to meet this industry need.”