Singapore, Nov 27, 2009: Taiwan's National Cheng Kung University (NCKU), has signed a MoU with ScinoPharm Taiwan to develop novel therapeutic agents.

As per the MoU, both partners will build competitive advantage in the knowledge-based industries in the greater China region and other territories. Moreover, they will also facilitate the relevant training of team members which are needed for the projects through exchanges of personnel on a mutually beneficial basis, and will explore opportunities for cooperation in any other areas of mutual interests.

“This is a good start between NCKU and ScinoPharm Taiwan. I hope to establish the university-industry cooperation and make a big breakthrough on the development of biotechnology industry in the future, which is one of the key industries for the future as declared by the Executive Yuan,” said NCKU President Michael Lai.

Biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry has been developed for 20 years, and has especially made a big progress in the past 10 years. It is also one of the six emerging industries specially selected by the Executive Yuan for intensive development. Universities and higher education in Taiwan have produced many graduates with related majors every year. However, the unemployment rate is relatively the highest in biotechnology industry, compared to the other industries. Obviously, students’ trainings in universities could not fit into the demand of this industry. On the other hand, Taiwan has relatively succeeded in the upstream R&D of the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries. However, the fruitful R&D outcomes from the upstream could not be smoothly transferred to the downstream production in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries. Almost all scientists in the upstream R&D were trained from universities and did not learn corporate management in colleges, which led to miscommunication between the upstream R&D and the downstream production, and eventually the misfortune of the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries. There is a common saying that the successful industries are almost those without any scientists’ involvement. Scientist did not know how to organize and operate the industry. This has posted quite a difficult task in Taiwan, especially in biotechnology area. Therefore, President Lai appreciated and praised that NCKU had the opportunity to collaborate with ScinoPharm Taiwan, which is considered as the top of Taiwan’s biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries.

“To be honest, without the cultivation and assistance of NCKU, there would be no ScinoPharm Taiwan today,” said Dr. Jo Shen. She appreciated the contribution and kind help of NCKU. There are so many employees from NCKU. Even more, the first two laboratories of ScinoPharm Taiwan were in the Chemical Engineering Buildings of NCKU. That is, the first-day-at-work of ScinoPharm’s senior employees in the company was indeed at NCKU. “NCKU has the opportunity to become the first biosimilar clinical center over the world. Both of us hope to establish the collaborative relationship in the exchange of students, education, and R&D. We also sincerely hope to have much closer relationship with NCKU especially in proteinomics and R&D in protein drugs,” said Dr. Jo Shen.