GE Healthcare, a global company that provides transformational medical technologies and services to meet the demand for increased access, enhanced quality and more affordable healthcare around the world has signed an agreement with Sigma-Aldrich to distribute its Whatman range of products in India.

The Whatman range of innovative papers and filters includes sample collection and storage cards (FTA cards), filter papers, and specialist diagnostic membranes used in a wide range of applications such as forensics, neonatal screening, environmental screening, quality control of pharmaceuticals, food and beverage production and in the manufacture of in-vitro diagnostic tests. Many leading Indian companies and institutions use Whatman products for advancing their life sciences research and medical technology applications.

The company noted that its Whatman FTA cards are widely used for collection, storage, transportation and purification of DNA as well as blood samples as it eliminates the need for expensive freezers and risk of transporting bottled blood samples.

GE Healthcare Life Sciences provides expertise and tools for a wide range of applications, including basic research of cells and proteins, drug discovery research, as well as technologies for start-to-finish large-scale manufacturing of biopharmaceuticals. The company has been steadily increasing its footprint in India through the establishment of an R&D center, Fast Trak BioPharma Services to support the rapidly growing biopharmaceutical industry in India, and a customer training and education center in Bangalore.

Mr Anurag Gupta, Managing Director, GE Healthcare Life Sciences South Asia, said,"This distribution agreement with Sigma Aldrich will allow GE Healthcare to bring its innovative Whatman products to a much wider range of customers in a variety of academic and industry settings across India."

Mr. Raja Ram, Managing Director, Sigma-Aldrich, India said, "Continuing to deliver on our mission of enabling science to improve the quality of life, we are excited at the partnership we have forged with GE Healthcare Life Sciences to distribute Whatman products. The partnership will enable customers to benefit from Sigma-Aldrich's established standards of service and operational excellence within India."