Li says it is projects like the Human Genome Project and the International HapMap Project that gave BGI a solid foundation in its early years, allowing the company to learn best international research practices and exchange knowledge with researchers all over the world.

Building on this knowledge, BGI then got involved in many more commercial research collaboration projects, with hospitals, universities and individual companies in the pharmaceutical, healthcare and food sectors. It has about 1,200 collaboration projects running worldwide.

Li says one key advantage BGI has is its hardware, which consists of high-technology systems used in the genetic testing and clinical trials, and which helps its partners do better research and development and implement the results in clinical trials.

These advanced tools are developed through the expertise of BGI's strong R&D team, as BGI's growth coincided with a large increase of highly skilled scientists in China, he says.

Another milestone of BGI's growth was in 2010, when it bought 128 of Illumina's state-of-the-art DNA sequencing machines, each costing $500,000, according to the MIT Technology Review. It now owns more than 240 sequencers from several manufacturers, which enables BGI to sequence 30,000 human genomes a year.

BGI has achieved a number of significant technology milestones. In 2003, it decoded the SARS virus genome and created a kit for detecting the virus, and in 2011 BGI did the genome sequencing for the deadly E. coli outbreak in Germany in three days under an open license, meaning the results of the research are freely available.

In 2013, Li says, BGI's acquisition of Complete Genomics allowed BGI to gain access to the technology that collects data on DNA, an area traditionally dominated by US companies.

"It would be less efficient for us to develop this technology ourselves, because China's technology is not yet advanced enough to achieve such technology, but through the acquisition we are now armed with genome sequencing technology and our service will become more integrated and cost effective for our clients," Li says.

BGI has about 4,000 employees globally. BGI Europe has about 20 employees based in Denmark who travel across Europe to work with its partners.

BGI has participated in major government-backed projects both domestically and internationally. It has played a key role in building the Shenzhen-based China National Genebank, which holds data on genomics that are made available for medical institutions and research organizations.

In this project, BGI worked with four Chinese government departments - the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Science and Technology, and the Ministry of Health.

It participates in Genome Denmark, a research project that aims to map the genome of the Danish population. Li says because the technology provided by BGI to projects such as China National Genebank and Genome Denmark are of a uniform standard, data users should find it very easy to compare data across the different projects.

cecily.liu@chinadaily.com.cn