Is PacBio Cursed?

A reader commented after my recent post that PacBio seems to be cursed.

I asked google who can help remove this curse and they helpfully suggested:

• Exorcists

• Shamans

• Energy Workers

• Witches

However, the one thing I know about curses is they are susceptible to wordplay.

For example the witches in Macbeth… wriggling out of saying he will be killed by “one not born of woman” by saying that includes cesarean section. Cesarean section is clearly a way of being born.

So if the PacBio name is cursed, we have a couple of potential solutions:

Firstly we could just change the name. Some new names for PacBio might include:

• Awesome Sequencing Company

• What-what, what, what? Sequencing.1

• The Company We Agree To Buy A Sequencer From2

• Why Wont Anyone Buy Our Sequencer When It Clearly Produces The Highest Quality Sequence Data?

A slightly more ridiculous way of changing the name has been suggested however:

Which then got discussed on LinkedIn by Angry Dickinson3 and others. Oxford purchasing PacBio would bring some clear benefits:

• Massive amount of debt.

• 500+ Extra people to fire.

• Huge empty offices4 you need to keep paying for.

But there are some downsides too. For example sales reps would be tasked with handling the following interactions:

SalesRep: “So, you know you’ve bought one long read sequencer from us which we said was better than the other long read sequencer.”

CoreMaster: “Yeah”

SalesRep: “Well actually the other one is better buy that one too.”

CoreMaster: “They are both better?”

SalesRep: “Yes, they are both better. You need to buy both.”

CoreMaster: “That doesn’t make sense”

SalesRep: “BUY BOTH! JUST BUY BOTH!”

Now for PacBio sales folks who had previously been tasked with selling multiple conflicting product lines. This may come somewhat naturally.. but for the 674 SGA folks at Oxford Nanopore it will be a new experience.

So.. to avoid this instead I suggest Oxford buy Nociscan. Nociscan is listed on the NASDAQ has a market cap of only $8M. So you get that sweet NASDAQ listing we all lust for.

But there’s an added bonus reader… Nociscan makes lower back pain diagnostic tools! So when you tell Oxford Nanopore support your sequencer is being a pain is the ass they will know exactly who to forward your call to.

Good luck everybody!