From Alchemy to IPO

"Almost as soon as the young companies and their partners started clinical development of the first biotech products, the problem of drug delivery reared its ugly head."

"Companies like Millennium Pharmaceuticals are using a technique termed positional cloning genomics to look for regions of chromosomes containing genes that seem to show up every time a patient has a certain disease."

"No Biochip could hold every possible variation of every human gene. Choosing the best probes for the best applications will continue to be a major competitive factor among chip manufacturers."

"Gene therapy is an area where strong corporate partnering will probably be crucial to bringing together all of the resources needed to effectively bring a commercial product to market."

"Most people in the industry agree that pure contract synthesis of novel chemical libraries is essentially a commodity business."

"Most biotech investors are not able to judge the basic science of a company. However, a good understanding of the product development process can go a long way to giving you benchmarks for judging the relative risk of individual product candidates."

"One of the real challenges in raising venture capital is the small number of truly visionary investors. If your technology is not in fashion, it's like pulling teeth to get them to look seriously at your plan."

"You don't need to know how personal computers or cell phones work to invest intelligently in Nokia or Dell Computers. But it can be very tricky making investment decisions in biotech stocks when the science is still driving events."

"In tough times, when the usual suspects are just not interested in plain vanilla secondary stock offerings, biotech execs and their bankers have been able to generate cash with a series of alternative approaches that target subsets of investors."

"Why would biotech companies share the fruits of their labor with potential competitors?"

"Taking a chance on the small cap biotech stocks could pay off if you do your research carefully and don't mind enduring the nail-biting risk."