Workplace return drive as Scots firm rolls out 'affordable and accurate' barcode-style Covid test

A Glasgow firm has developed an “affordable and accurate” barcode-style Covid test that could help open up workplaces by reassuring staff and employers.

BioClavis, set up in 2017 as a spin-out from California-based life sciences firm BioSpyder Technologies, is based at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital campus in Glasgow. Picture: Martin Shields

BioClavis, set up in 2017 as a spin-out from California-based life sciences firm BioSpyder Technologies, is based at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital campus in Glasgow.

The BioClavis test, developed in collaboration with BioSpyder, detects the virus using an innovative biological barcoding technique.

Joel McComb, chief executive and founder of both companies, said: “With a minor modification to our core ‘TempO-Seq’ technology, we’re able to incorporate biological barcodes to track individual patient samples and their results at scale for Covid-19 and other respiratory infections.

“This enables a high volume of patient results to be analysed by a highly accurate and low-cost automated process.”

Using this method, the firm said it had the capability to process 100,000 samples a day by the end of January.

Despite the potential roll out of mass testing programmes, limited national testing capacity does not allow for the routine screening necessary to enable workplaces to return to more normal ways of operating.

While vaccines are now starting to be rolled out, widespread access and immunity will take time to establish. BioClavis believes that its tests will help address this gap.

Through to March, the company aims to be in a position to scale from 100,000 tests per day to more than one million.

Harper VanSteenhouse of BioClavis added: “Our testing capabilities will make large scale, accurate and inexpensive screening routinely and widely available, helping to open up our society and the economy.”

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