Public Access to Illumina/Grail Trial Provided via Teleconference Due to ongoing COVID-19 Concerns

The administrative trial in the matter of Illumina, Inc., and GRAIL, Inc. (D- 9401) is scheduled to begin on Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021 at 10 a.m. ET, following a prehearing conference on Monday, Aug. 23, 2021 at 2 p.m. ET. This type of proceeding usually takes place at the Federal Trade Commission’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., but this trial will be completely virtual in light of ongoing public health concerns. The trial will be open to the public, except for those sessions that the Chief Administrative Law Judge orders to be closed, or held in camera. The public will be able to access the proceeding via telephone conference, as follows:

Dialing instructions for pretrial conference and administrative trial:

                                                      Toll-Free:    877-226-8189

                                                      Access Code:  4302283

In March 2021, the FTC filed an administrative complaint alleging that Illumina’s $7.1 billion proposed acquisition of Grail will diminish innovation in the U.S. market for MCED, or multi-cancer early detection, tests. MCED tests could be used to detect up to 50 types of cancer, most of which are not screened for at all today, saving millions of lives around the world. Grail is one of several competitors racing to develop these liquid biopsy tests, which analyze a sample of a patient’s blood or other fluid through DNA sequencing.