So the market isn’t small. We think there are about 150, 000 indeterminate cases in the US alone that equates to about a $400 million market opportunity and in terms of converted market we think that the converted market is in the range of $45 to $50 Million dollars today led by Variscite and you may see a consistent theme here. They have a Messenger RNA based test. We are going to come to market with a Micro RNA based test so we think we will have some competitive advantages over them in the marketplace. Bladder cancer is the next product we are going to bring to market. This is really about risk stratifying those people with super facial Bladder Cancer to determine who is likely to progress or recur to invasive Bladder Cancer the kind that will kill you. As I mentioned we’ve had two studies in this area we are very excited to get going on this after we finish the thyroid project we expect to launch this in 2016.
We are working on all timers with a partner a large pharma partner who has Therapeutics in the space who has great access to samples which is the critical piece to everything we do and has a lot of knowledge in this space. We have just started working on determining whether or not we are going to find a Micro RNA signature here but I don’t think I have to tell anybody here the opportunity is huge. So this is a very worth wile shot on goal for us so more to come on this as we have more data to share. There are a whole bunch of other indications but I don’t have time to go in them right now. So in terms of the IP space we’ve got three levels of IP protection, composition of matter, the technologies and methods of use and these have a number of patterns issued.
We are licensed in some of the seminal IP in this space so we have those barriers but in addition there is a lot of know how as I mentioned before Micro RNAs are difficult to work with so we have developed a lot of know how and we are using that capability to sell to pharmaceutical companies to really leverage our capabilities in collaboration with them. So we have announced several collaborations already this year one in the self therapy area with a large biotech company, a strategic alliance with Marina Biotech.
We have recently announced we are picking on DMD as the first area to look for new drug targets for Micro RNAs. We’ve got research collaborations and all timers as I mentioned and we recently announced a strategic alliance with Moffitt Cancer Center a leading academic center that’s really got a tremendous amount of expertise in the area of cancer a tremendous sample back they will really help us move our portfolio in oncology forward. So in terms of the foot print of the company we have just over 50 employees, 33 in the US and 19 in Israel. In Israel we do all of our R&D we do our discovery, our development and then everything gets moved to our lab rotary in Philadelphia cap and clear certified we have New York certifications for all of our tests and all the samples from around the world come to Philadelphia for processing if they are commercial samples and because Micro RNAs is so stable there is no special handling they just get sent by federal express and we have the leading turnaround time.
So from sample arrival to our lab to report out its an average four and a half days and in terms of the footprint in the lab we have plenty of opportunity to expand in place no need to move the lab anywhere else there is plenty of room in Philadelphia to expand to meet any anticipated demand. So briefly on financials we have just under $12 million shares out got a million ones are in options, no converts, no debt. We had $21 million in cash and short term bank deposit in the middle of the year and we announced publicly that cash as of September of this year was sufficient to fund operations in 2016. So in terms of key milestones and achievements one of the things that we set out to do this year is really leverage our platform against other opportunities for pharma and biotech companies. We have done that we have initiated three.
