The Spirit Of A Startup Lives On

It sounds like a classic debacle. A small biotech firm battling difficult odds and major setbacks discovers a promising drug for cancer. But after a series of mergers, the upstart is swallowed by a pharmaceutical goliath and operations are shut down. Although the big drugmaker continues to develop the treatment, the innovative team behind it is scattered to the winds.

That, in a nutshell, is the history of a once-hot biotech firm called Sugen. But it is hardly a sob story. The chronicle of the company and its drug, Sutent, clearly illustrates how marriages between pioneering biotech companies and pharmaceutical giants can turn out to be both disruptive and productive.