Daktari Diagnostics Inc., a developer of point-of-care diagnostic systems for global health applications, announces that it has secured $10 million in a staged financing round from a syndicate of private and venture investors. Merck Global Health Innovation Fund led the round, joined by the company's current investor group, led by Norwich Ventures and the Partners Innovation Fund. Funds will be used to complete development and bring to market the company's initial products, intended for use in monitoring HIV patients worldwide, and to expand the point- of-care product development pipeline.

The Daktari diagnostic system is designed to analyze small volumes of blood or other fluids, for use in any type of health care setting. The technology was initially developed at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.

About Global Health Diagnostics
Many kinds of tests are used to diagnose and manage medical conditions. These can range from simple-to-use "rapid diagnostic tests" (RDTs), such as pregnancy tests, to microscopes and glucose meters, to machines used for sequencing genes or detecting the presence of viruses. Despite advances in medical testing technologies, many of the most common conditions worldwide-including leading diseases like HIV, tuberculosis, cancer, measles, or pneumonia-suffer from an absence of simple-to-use tests that enable clinicians to diagnose and treat diseases effectively. There is significant demand for simple-to-use, accurate, and affordable diagnostic tests for these conditions. A recent report from FIND Diagnostics and the World Health Organization, for instance, suggests that the demand for a tuberculosis diagnostic test exceeds 750 million tests annually, with nearly 200 million tests needed annually in point-of-care formats.

About HIV
HIV affects nearly 35 million people worldwide, the majority of whom live in low- and middle-income countries. With the support of more than $15 billion in annual funding, the number of new HIV infections in low- and middle-income countries has begun to stabilize over the past decade, as 6.65 million people have begun lifelong treatment at more than 22,000 health facilities worldwide. The United Nations and the World Health Organization recently announced a plan to achieve universal access to care for all HIV-infected people by 2015.

About Daktari Diagnostics (www.daktaridx.com)

Daktari Diagnostics develops simple, accurate, and affordable diagnostic tests that address challenges in global health. The Company was founded in 2008 and is headquartered in Cambridge, MA.