Taconic Releases eTaconic® 2.0 Online Colony Management Portal

Hudson, New York — November 5, 2013 - Taconic announced the release of eTACONIC® 2.0, the company's online rodent colony management portal that clients access to manage their breeding projects. Taconic launched the industry's first online rodent colony management system (eTACONIC®) in 2006 and has made continuous improvements each year since its release. eTACONIC® 2.0 builds upon those innovations by adding significant new features that help clients more efficiently manage their colonies with Taconic. Among the most prominent new features are portfolio views of multiple projects, personalized dashboards, access to historical project data, and the ability to track projects from model generation through delivery of research-ready mice and rats.

The new features of eTACONIC® 2.0 greatly enhance the functionality of previous versions of the online colony management portal. Scientists are able to access real-time data on vital aspects of their breeding projects, such as genotyping results and inventories of animals available for studies. Clients can also use eTACONIC® 2.0 to communicate with Taconic' project management team, initiate new projects, change project goals, and schedule deliveries. These key functionalities empower scientists and other key client personnel to efficiently manage colonies, share data with colleagues, improve study planning, and access real-time data to facilitate decision making.

David T. Hansen, President of Taconic's Research Models and Solutions business unit, commented on the importance of the new online colony management release: "eTACONIC® 2.0 is a key communication tool linking our clients to their projects and is an integral part of our project management process. The relationship that exists between our clients and Taconic's Scientific Program Managers is paramount to the success of projects, particularly the breeding of genetically engineered and humanized models that are complex and require high levels of communication and coordination. eTACONIC® 2.0 also makes transitioning a project from one investigator or client department to another quite easy as the entire project plan, past results and current inventory are accessible with a few clicks of a mouse."

eTACONIC® 2.0 improves upon previous versions of the portal's ability to manage, distribute and display data. Data captured in colony production facilities is immediately available for viewing on eTACONIC® 2.0. Clients logging into the eTACONIC® 2.0 portal are able to personalize dashboards which contain graphs and charts of key project metrics. By using their mouse to hover over bar charts, users can click on any bar to drill deeper into the data. Moreover, as with previous versions of eTACONIC®, data can be downloaded into a variety of file types. This makes it easy for scientists to analyze and share data between their internal teams.

Dr. John Couse, Associate Director of Scientific Program Management, commented on the importance of data to Taconic's clients. "In our user testing of eTACONIC® the past few years we have learned more about the importance to clients of timely and accurate data, and how it facilitates their decision making processes on the projects they run with us and the studies they are conducting for their organizations. Such insights shaped the way we approached the dashboards and other key data elements of eTACONIC® 2.0. Taconic's goal was to make data available as fast as possible and display it in a user-friendly way that is easily accessible. eTACONIC® 2.0 has achieved that goal."

About Taconic
Taconic is a global provider of genetically engineered mouse and rat models and services. As a full-service industry leader, founded in 1952, Taconic helps clients acquire, test, develop, breed, cryopreserve, prepare, and distribute highly relevant research lines worldwide. Headquartered in New York's Hudson River Valley, Taconic operates six breeding facilities and three service laboratories in the U.S. and Europe and maintains over 850 employees committed to technological innovation. Taconic's products and services are used by over 1,300 companies and academic research institutions in nearly 50 nations worldwide.