"I guess the winning consortium made a defensive, market-clearing purchase," Müller said.

The public consortium is making its data public, believing that medical and scientific progress depend on open access to the sequence.

Today, the private consortium has made about $29 million in loans, with only 2 percent of the total in default.

Although the consortium makes all its data immediately available, Celera is not obliged to release anything.

Last year the consortium made its first 'operating profit'.

Such a consortium would make what one might call "wide-body" movies, to continue the aircraft parallel.

Google lost the auction as a consortium including Apple and Microsoft made the winning bid of $4.5bn (£2.8bn).

The consortium has not set a price or made a formal offer, but this type of approach is generally the precursor to a bid.

But in catching up with Celera, the consortium can now make the assembled mouse genome freely available, as well.

The 11-company consortium will make its pipeline recommendation on Sept. 18.