US-based Illumina Inc., a global leader in DNA sequencing and array-based technologies, has announced the opening of a new office and state-of-the-art Illumina Solutions Centre in Bengaluru.

Illumina's expansion comes after 16 years of working closely with the company's channel partner in India- Premas Life Sciences. Now with its own permanent facility, Illumina will continue to collaborate with Premas to grow the genomics market in India. Expanding access to genomics in this important market will help unlock opportunities for advancing health care and combating the effects of climate change in South Asia.

The new Illumina Solutions Centre features a fully equipped laboratory housing the latest next-generation sequencing (NGS) and array technologies, and it is fully resourced with field applications and service engineers to offer Illumina's partners and customers broad genomics capabilities. The centre will support Illumina's growing number of channel partners in the region by providing training and education to increase local technical expertise and access to genomics.

Illumina employs over 30 people in India, in sales, operations, marketing, government relations, and human resources, and more hiring is expected as Illumina moves to scale operations there. The business is led by Abhishek Gupta, Country Manager.