MatriCal Inc., the Spokane-based maker of devices used in pharmaceutical research, says it has reached an agreement with a leading neuroscience company to supply equipment for that companys drug-development operations.


MatriCal sold one of its robotic storage-and-retrieval units to Neurocrine Biosciences Inc., of San Diego, which has developed a number of drug therapies currently undergoing clinical trials, says MatriCal owner Kevin Oldenburg.


MatriCals MatriStore units, which sell for more than $1 million apiece, are room-sized devices that use computer-controlled robots to organize, store, and retrieve chemical compounds being tested for drug development. One MatriStore unit can store about 11 million samples and handle up to 20,000 samples a day, Oldenburg says.


Neurocrine will use the unit in its drug-discovery research, which includes developing therapies for diseases such as insomnia, multiple sclerosis, and diabetes, Oldenburg says. The MatriStore unit will be installed at Neurocrines headquarters in San Diego this June, he says.


Oldenburg developed the compound-storage technology when he worked for DuPont Pharmaceuticals in 1999, before he and co-founder Dan Roark launched MatriCal in 2000. MatriCal started manufacturing the MatriStore units in 2002, and so far has sold two other units to dermatological drug maker Galderma, based in France, and Groton, Conn.-based Pfizer Inc. The company may sell another MatriStore unit later this month, Oldenburg says.


In addition to targeting drug-development companies, MatriCal has been discussing tentative plans to market MatriStore units to hospitals around the country, Oldenburg says. Also, the University of California-San Diego Medical Center has shown interest in the storage devices, which could make organization of patients tissue samples and microscope slides more efficient, he says.


They need to be able to store them, then find them again quickly, he says. Theyre just held in a file cabinet now, and are almost impossible to find quickly.


MatriCal makes and sells a range of other products, including disposable tips that dispense liquid in minute volumes, Oldenburg says. The 384 tips, which are used on a separate device made by another company, dispense 50 to 200 nanoliters of liquid, with 50 nanoliters equating to about 1/200th of a drop of liquid, he says. Pharmaceutical companies pay about $185 for a set of 384 tips, which are used when moving small samples of a compound being tested, he says.


Another MatriCal device, called a sonicator, produces high-energy sound waves to break up cells in a similar way to how a sonic jewelry cleaner breaks down jewelry residue, though its about 1,000 times more powerful, Oldenburg says. Pharmaceutical companies often use the sonicator to drive compounds back into a solution to be tested. MatriCal, which has obtained patents for the sonication technology it invented, believes that sonication may be a $30-million-a-year market.


MatriCal began marketing the sonication units last year after developing the technology about three or four years ago. It has sold a few units and will begin full production next month, Oldenburg says.


MatriCal, which now employs 14 people, recently doubled its space in the Spokane Intercollegiate Research and Technology Institute building to 4,000 square feet, Oldenburg says. The company, which was founded in 2000 and moved to Spokane from Pennsylvania in 2002, needed the additional 2,000 square feet for more space to manufacture the sonicator devices, he says.


Before the extra space at SIRTI opened up, Oldenburg and Roark considered moving their company to the Spokane Industrial Park, Oldenburg says. Though MatriCal will remain at SIRTI for now, the institute may not have enough available space to contain the companys expanding operations, he says.


Theres not a huge incentive to move right now, but were still small enough to keep our options open, Oldenburg says.


Depending on how MatriCals business goes, the company may leave SIRTI by 2005, he says.


MatriCal had sales of about $3.5 million last year, and expects that figure to jump to between $5 million and $7 million this year, he says.