• Event Date: January 26 (Tuesday), 2010
• Time: 6:30pm
• Event Moderator: Dr. George J. Lee , General Partner and Cofounder of Amkey Ventures, LLC; Board Director, Monte Jade
• Event Speaker: Dr. Ben Chien, Founder, President and CEO, QPS Holdings
• Event Speaker: Dr. Tony Zhang, Cofounder, President and CEO, Formurex
• Attached Voices:
• Attached pdf/htm:flyer1.pdf; flyer-2.pdf
• Attached ppt:
• Location: China Stix, 2110 El Camino Real, Santa Clara, CA 95050
• Contact Info: Monte Jade Secretary Office (408)428-0388
• Register: Link to Registration Page

Please register in advance and pay on site

Member $25, Non-Member $30, Student $20, extra $5 for site registration  />
Speech is delivered in English
Dinner is provided

Description:
Contract Research Organizations (CROs) have existed as an important part of the pharmaceutical industry. The CRO services play critical roles in the drug development process including drug discovery, pre-clinical, clinical phase 1, phase 2, and phase 3 studies. Recently due to healthcare reform and the worldwide economic changes, there has been an increasing trend amongst pharmaceutical companies toward outsourcing their drug research and development programs to CROs. The two speakers are very successful entrepreneurs. They founded their CRO companies to serve pharmaceutical companies in specific areas and have been able to expand their businesses to become very profitable. In this Bioforum they will share their successful experiences with the participants. This Bioforum will provide the participants with an excellent opportunity to learn how to become an entrepreneur and to join the work force in the CRO industry.

Moderator: Dr. George J. Le(李家榮博士)
General Partner and Cofounder of Amkey Ventures, LLC
Board Director, Monte Jade
Panelists:
Dr. Ben Chien(簡銘達博士), Founder, President and CEO, QPS Holdings, LLC
Dr. Tony Zhang(張東曉博士), Co-founder, President and CEO, Formurex, Inc

Register: Please visit www.montejade.org
Please register in advance and pay on site
Fee: Member & Student $25, Non-member $30, extra $5 for site registration (Chinese dinner included)

Speaker bios

Dr. Benjamin Chien (簡銘達博士)
Founder, President and CEO of QPS Holdings, LLC

Dr. Benjamin Chien founded QPS, LLC (formerly Quest Pharmaceutical Services) in 1995 as a single site CRO focused on bio-analytical GLP services. Under Dr. Chien’s vision and guidance, Dr. Chien now heads the three entities that constitute QPS Holdings, LLC:
- QPS, LLC in Newark, Delaware focused on bio-analytical GLP, DMPK and TLM services,
- QPS Bio-Kinetic in Springfield, Missouri offering clinical phase-1 services, and
- QPS Taiwan in Taipei, Taiwan offering clinical/bio-analytical services
In addition, QPS offers business development client services with offices based strategically to service clients across the USA and globally.

Through Dr. Chien and QPS team’s untiring efforts, QPS is recognized as a premier Contract Research Organization. QPS received a prestigious ‘Philadelphia 100’ Award from Wharton SBDC in 2005, as one of the 100 fastest-growing businesses in the greater-Philadelphia tri-state area. And, in 2008, Dr. Chien is the recipient of the 2008 Delaware Bioscience Association Service Award for his years of contributions and financial support to the development of bioscience in Delaware. Ben currently serves as the Board of Director for Delaware Bioscience Association, Board of Trustees for The Castilleja School in Palo Alto, and serves as the Advisor for Chinese Bioscience Association in Bay area.

Dr. Chien began his pharmaceutical career at DuPont Merck Pharmaceutical Co. in the Drug Metabolism and Pharmacokinetics Section, where he built the LC/MS/MS group dedicated to supporting drug discovery, preclinical and clinical studies. In 1996, he received the Summit Award, the highest level of achievement at DuPont Merck, for his dedicated contribution to the development of Efavirenz, an anti-viral drug approved by the FDA for the treatment of HIV disease. In addition, he is the co-inventor of a novel Ion Trap/Time-of-Flight Mass Spectrometer. Dr. Chien obtained his PhD in analytical chemistry (mass spectrometry) from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor with Prof. David M. Lubman. A review article of his graduate school work was awarded as “The Best Student Paper of 1994” by International Journal of Mass Spectrometry and Ion Processes.

Dr. Tony Zhang (張東曉博士)

Dr. Dongxiao (Tony) Zhang is the co-founder, President and CEO of Formurex, Inc., a pharmaceutical CRO in Stockton, CA, USA. He is also an adjunct professor in the Department of Pharmaceutics and Medicinal Chemistry at University of the Pacific in Stockton, California. Before co-founding Formurex, Dr. Zhang was the co-founder and vice president of Epitomics, Inc., a leading antibody company in Burlingame, California. At Epitomics, Dr. Zhang led the technology development in the company where he was awarded by the U.S. government with multiple SBIR grants (Phase I and II). Prior to his Epitomics venture, Dr. Zhang was a senior research scientist in the Biotechnology Division at Bayer Corporation. At Bayer, Dr. Zhang headed a high throughput screening (HTS) group to screen for novel drug leads and to discover antibody targets for cancer and angiogenesis (blood vessel formation). Dr. Zhang obtained his Ph.D. in Biochemistry at Case Western Reserve University and did his postdoctoral research at Genentech, Inc. At Genentech, he was a key member in the functional genomics team, developing advanced technologies and discovering novel drug targets and therapeutic proteins. He has 36 patent applications and 7 issued patents. He obtained his MBA from St. Mary’s Collage in California.

Moderator: Dr. George J. Lee
General Partner and Cofounder of Amkey Ventures, LLC
Board Director, Monte Jade

George J. Lee, Ph.D. is a general partner and co-founder of AmKey Ventures, LLC, a venture management company specializing in investments in the biotech and pharmaceutical fields. Dr. Lee has extensive experience in the pharmaceutical industry having worked productively at a major pharmaceutical company (Syntex) for 13 years and early stage biomedical companies (Sonus and Shaman Pharmaceuticals) for 7 years. Dr. Lee is an internationally known pioneer in the field of steroid hormones research. His HPLC-RIA method has been recognized as the most accurate and sensitive method for the determination of trace amounts of steroid hormones in the complex biological matrices. Dr. Lee has in depth experience in analytical methods development and validation for New Drug Application (NDA) as well as various applications to the Food & Drug Administration.
Dr. Lee is a co-founder of PHARMout Laboratories, Inc., which is a contract research organization specializing in analytical research. PHARMout Laboratories has received excellent results from several FDA inspections. PHARMout Labs. has achieved an over 30% net profit margin and consequently provided good return to its shareholders.
Dr. Lee earned his Ph.D. degree in chemistry from the State University of New York at Buffalo and his B.S. degree in agricultural chemistry from National Taiwan University, Taiwan.

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