Chiral Quest Names New CEO, Expands
Digital Transition: Slide Design To Creative Media
ETS Sells Capstar, a For-Profit, to Thomson
Corrections or additions?
These articles by Barbara Fox were prepared for the August 18,
2004 issue of U.S. 1 Newspaper. All rights reserved.
Life in the Fast Lane
Among the more than 200 R&D companies in greater Princeton are more
than 120 firms with fewer than a dozen employees – just the kind of
firms that need small spaces. And small lab space, incubator-size or
slightly larger, is hard to find. Using land in East Windsor that his
family has owned for 35 years, Michael J. Simon hopes to attract these
labs and tap the potential of Princeton as a petri dish for biotech
businesses.
Simon says he learned patience from the lifelong interest in the Asian
strategy game of Go. “My father taught me a key rule for business –
play dumb. And the game of Go taught me patience,” says Simon. “When
you make a mistake, that stone looks at you for the whole game, so you
learn to go slowly and carefully.”
The first of four buildings in his high-tech development will have 10
wet laboratories. Called SciPark (sciparknj.com), the proposed
270,000-foot park is situated on 35 acres, located just off Route 133
on Old Trenton Road (Edinburg Road), north of Route 571 and across
from Windsor Corporate Park.
The first building is scheduled to be completed in January, 2006, and
R&D companies will be able to lease a laboratory as small as 6,000
square feet. Each lab will have two drainage systems, an
effluent-cleaning machine area, dock-height loading bays, computer
network lines, and an employee lounge. Stephen Tolcash of GVA Buschman
is the exclusive leasing broker and the space is listing for $15.50
net, plus $5 per square foot common area charge.
“With current vacancy rates for single-story, flex-R&D facilities in
this marketplace well under 8 percent, there is a significant demand
for the unique space being offered at SciPark,” says Simon. “Unlike
most of the big-box flex space in central New Jersey, SciPark will
meet the needs of smaller users and will feature the flexible
structural design to accommodate a wide variety of tenant needs. There
is simply no other comparable space being planned in central New
Jersey like SciPark.”
Paul McArthur of Trillium Realty Advisors in Hopewell is the
development manager for SciPark. “I can say that if it weren’t for
Paul I wouldn’t be developing this,” says Simon. The shell was
designed by site planner John Chester, and the design is by Keith Hone
of Hone & Associates.
Even though SciPark is expensive to build, it is reasonable in
comparison to retrofitting another space to be a laboratory, says
Simon. “The spaces are small but bigger than an incubator and much
smaller than the competitive private developers.”
Labs are new for Simon, who for 25 years has been building small
warehouses on reasonably priced smaller plots of land where streets
have been cuts and city blocks formed. “If you are a small developer,
he points out, “it is hard to find three to five acres.”
He found success in Twin Rivers, which has what he calls “reasonable”
setback requirements. He built two warehouses there, one on Lake Drive
occupied now by Windsor Tech, the electronics equipment recycling
firm, and one on Twin Rivers Drive occupied by NexMed. NexMed, the
impotence cream company that is headquartered in Robbinsville, wanted
to fit out the warehouse as laboratory. “Then I asked, why am I
building warehouses? Why don’t I just build laboratories,” says Simon.
“That’s how I got the idea of SciPark.”
“We are still in the permit process,” he says, “and getting the first
or second tenant might be hard.” But the state of New Jersey is
financially encouraging the growth of biotech companies “and venture
capital is sitting on a ton of money.”
A 1975 graduate of Columbia, Simon completed most of the course work
for a PhD in English from Brown (focusing on the poetry of John
Ashbery). He learned Japanese so he could read Go books, and has
attained the impressive rank of 5 Don. He worked in real estate in
Tokyo, where he established a funky, for Tokyo, New York-style Jewish
deli, and he met his future wife. A multi-faceted personality,
self-labeled as “a bit of a nerd,” he also speaks Spanish and French
and is an avid web page developer. SciPark is one of the few
developments with its own web page.
Since 1984, his company, Simon Developments LLC, has developed and
renovated commercial real estate projects totaling a million square
feet. Simon also has a business that makes smart cards for mass
transit fare collection.
Simon describes his family background: “I come from a family that
takes farmland and builds industrial buildings.” He grew up in
Teaneck, where his father, David Simon, was one of the first postwar
industrial developers. “In Englewood he built five warehouses at a
time when it was hard to get steel,” says Simon. “He almost went
broke, but he sold them all. In 1951 he developed Moonachie at the
time that it was all farms.”
The “right” time to develop the East Windsor land never came for
Simon’s father. “My father was waiting for the state to build Route
133, and he didn’t live to see it developed,” says Simon. “They
finished Route 133 two years after he died. But as you drive around
the jughandle, you pass the back of our site. We can’t put signs up
there, but I think people will see the towers through the trees.”
Trillium Realty Advisors LLC, 83 Princeton Avenue, Suite3C, Hopewell 08525. Paul McArthur, president. 609-466-0400; fax,609-466-2940. Home page: www.trilliumrealty.com and www.sciparknj.com.Top Of PageHeartland Doing IPOHeartland Payment Systems Inc. has filed plans to go public on Nasdaqwith an initial stock offering worth as much as $75 million.Heartland, which provides credit-card processing systems, has itscorporate headquarters and accounting office on Hulfish Street, but ofthe more than 700 employees, just a dozen work here. Other offices arein Ohio, Texas, Arizona, and Indiana.Founded in 1997 with a business investment of $1 million, Heartland isnow one of the largest privately owned payment processors. It offerscredit and debit card, payroll and related processing services to morethan 70,000 restaurant, hotel, and retail merchants throughout theUnited States. It was named to the Inc. 500 list of thefastest-growing private companies in America for two consecutive yearsand was ranked last year as seventh in the Top 25 Companies By Sizecategory.Proceeds of the IPO would help pay down $2.9 million in debt andredeem warrants to purchase 1 million shares of common stock. Theremainder would be used for general corporate purposes, includingworking capital and potential acquisitions.No price range for the shares was disclosed in the Securities andExchange Commission filing. Greenhill Capital Partners currently own28.2 percent of the firm, and LLR Equity Partners owns nearly 17percent.Heartland Payment Systems (HPAY), 47 Hulfish Street,Suite 400, Princeton 08542. Robert Baldwin, CFO. 888-798-3131; fax,609-683-3815. Home page: www.heartlandpaymentsystems.comTop Of PageChiral Quest Names New CEO, ExpandsChiral Quest Inc. has a new president and CEO, Ronald Brandt,replacing the founding CEO, Alan D. Roth. Brandt has created a newparent company, VioQuest Pharmaceuticals Inc. Chiral Quest willcontinue to work on its core technology – asymmetric products andservices including catalysis products and services – as a wholly ownedsubsidiary of VioQuest. Another wholly owned subsidiary, VioQuest DrugDevelopment Inc. will acquire, develop, and commercialize humantherapeutics.The company was an academic spinoff at Penn State in 2000, wasrestructured, and was launched as a listed company in February on theOTC bulletin board. It moved in June, 2003, to Princeton CorporatePlaza at 7 Deer Park Drive. The facility has a laboratory capable ofmaking multi-kilo quantities of large compounds; it has 50-literreactors and the latest in analytical instruments (U.S. 1, June 25,2003). Now it is a public company with almost 20 employees.”Chiral Quest is a leading supplier of chiral catalysts andintermediates in one of the fastest growing sectors of thepharmaceutical and fine chemical industries,” says Brandt, who is alsointerim president and CEO of VioQuest Pharmaceuticals Inc.”Over the last several months, I have been delighted to work with Ron,and believe he has the experience and personal qualities that a leaderof our company requires to maximize its value,” said Xumu Zhang, thechief technology officer, in a press release.Zhang (pronounced Shang), went to Wuhan University in the People’sRepublic of China, has a master’s degree from the University ofCalifornia at San Diego, and did doctoral and post doctoral work atStanford. He has consulted for Pfizer and Catalytica, holds severalpatents, and has received numerous awards. He spent a sabbatical witha Nobel laureate from California, K. Barry Sharpless, who is nowchairman of the scientific advisory board.Chiral Quest Inc. (CQST), 7 Deer Park Drive, PrincetonCorporate Plaza, Suite E-2, Monmouth Junction 08852. 732-274-0399;fax, 732-274-0402. Home page: www.chiralquest.comTop Of PageDigital Transition: Slide Design To Creative MediaSlide Design Interactive has changed its name to Creative Media Works,representing the design world’s paradigm shift to digital.”We do so much more than slides here – we are heading toward moreinteractive design and printing work,” says marketing director CarlyVan Fleet, daughter of Richard Van Fleet, who founded the company 15years ago.The firm initially focused on quality slides for corporatepresentations, plus brochure design and layout. It weathered thechange to digital by expanding its capabilities to digital imaging(large format posters, duplicating CDs and DVDs), and multimedia(websites, interactive CDs/DVDs, and animation).”Nevertheless, we still do powerpoint presentations for manyhealthcare clients – they have thousands of slides that need to beformatted,” says Carly Van Fleet. She graduated from the University ofCentral Florida in 2000, is assistant production manager, and is incharge of marketing for the 20-person firm.The name change has been in progress for about a year. “Internally wecame up with the name, but we worked with a marketing company –MarketEntry – to force us to keep to a schedule in making thedecisions,” she says. “We are hoping to attract new business and keepall our old clients. We have gotten a very positive response.”Creative Media Works, 44 South Main Street, Pennington08534. Richard Van Fleet, president. 609-737-1123; fax, 609-737-6345.Home page: www.creativemediaworks.comTop Of PageCompanies BoughtTaylor Technology Inc., 107 College Road East, Princeton08540. Paul Taylor, president. 609-951-0005; fax, 609-951-0080.Paul Taylor, who founded Taylor Technology in 1991, has sold hiscompany to SFBC International for $20.9 million, including $16.9million in cash and about $4 million in restricted common stock.Taylor announced this deal at the end of July. He has signed along-term employment agreement with the acquiring firm and all 65current employees are expected to continue with SFBC Analytical.SFBC International, Inc. provides specialized drug developmentservices to global and specialty pharmaceutical, biotechnology andgeneric drug companies.Taylor Technology Inc. provides bioanalytical laboratory services,especially mass spectrometry services for new drug programs for majorpharmaceutical companies. Using high-pressure liquidchromatography-tandem mass spectrometry and gas chromatography-tandemmass spectrometry, it can develop, validate, and perform methods forquantitative analysis of drugs and/or metabolites in biologicalfluids, such as blood, serum, plasma, or urine.Because Taylor and SFBC share only one significant client, the salerepresents a significant boost to SFBC’s client list.SFBC has a wholly-owned subsidiary that operates a bioanalyticallaboratory in Philadelphia, and it will spend $4 million for astate-of-the-art laboratory in Toronto, due to open next January.Other bioanalytical laboratories are in Quebec City and Barcelona.Oppenheimer & Co. Inc. (OPY), 302 Carnegie Center,Princeton 08540. Lawrence J. Rubenstein, branch manager/senior vicepresident. 609-734-0400; fax, 609-734-0939. Home page: www.opco.comWhen Fahnestock bought Oppenheimer last year, it took Oppenheimer’sname. Now this New York-based wealth management firm has 1,600financial advisors, 11 at this location, and nearly 100 branches. Itsclients are high net worth individuals, particularly those who needcorporate and executive services. It has $45 billion in client assets,says Lawrence J. Rubenstein, senior vice president.Top Of PageContracts AwardedBilltrust, 51 Everett Drive, Building B, Suite 50,Princeton Junction 08550. Flint Lane, president. 609-580-0050; fax,609-580-0041. Www.billtrust.comIDEXX Laboratories, a 2,500-person animal health technology companybased in Maine, signed a contrast for an automated billing systemprovided by Billtrust on Everett Drive.Billtrust reengineered invoices for IDEXX so that they incorporatevariable marketing messages and different payment options. Billtrustcreated a custom website that empowers customers to select or modifytheir preferred means for receiving bills, choosing from mail, E-mail,or fax.In June 84 Lumber Company signed a similar contract. Billtrust offersautomated invoicing and statement systems for small and medium-sizedbusinesses.Orchid BioSciences Inc./Cellmark (ORCH), 4390 Route 1North, Princeton 08543. Paul J. Kelly MD, CEO. 609-750-2200; fax,609-750-6400. Home page: www.orchid.comOrchid Cellmark has a contract from the National Institute of Justiceto create genetic profiles from DNA samples collected from Illinoisfelons. Mark Stolorow is executive director of Orchid Cellmark, theforensic DNA testing subsidiary of Orchid BioSciences Inc., which haslaboratories in Maryland, Tennessee, and Texas.On completion, the profiles will be added to the national Combined DNAIndex System, or CODIS, operated by the Federal Bureau ofInvestigation.The parent company, Orchid BioSciences, announced a smallersecond-quarter loss, thanks in part to more attention to high growthareas such as Orchid Cellmark. For the quarter, the loss was 10 centsper share compared to 90 cents last year.Princeton Lightwave Inc., 2555 Route 130 South, Suite 1,Cranbury 08512. Yves Dzialowski, CEO. 609-495-2600; fax, 609-395-9114.Home page: www.princetonlightwave.comIn July Princeton Lightwave landed an Air Force contract worth morethan $1 million to develop a next-generation laser technology for usein sensors and communications systems. The two-year contract issupposed to produce a powerful laser that is not damaging to humaneyes.Founded in 2000, Princeton Lightwave markets and develops highperformance optoelectronic components and subsystems.Voxware Inc., 168 Franklin Corner Road, Suite 3,Lawrenceville 08648. Tom Drury, CEO. 609-514-4100; fax, 609-514-4101.Home page: www.voxware.comTJX, the parent company of T.J. Maxx and Marshall’s stores, has boughtthe VoiceLogistics system of Voxware to use with its multilingualworkforce in Woburn, Massachusetts. Voxware’s pilot program provedthat workers who speak different languages can simultaneously interactwith the same application.”They really put our VoiceLogistics software through its paces,conducting an extensive pilot program that focused on logisticschallenges unique to the retail and garment industry sectors,” saysTom Drury, Voxware’s CEO.By interacting with workers, VoiceLogistics helps to coordinate aconveyor system, eliminating paper pick lists and verifying eachactivity as it occurs.Altech Star, 5 Independence Way, Suite 300, Princeton08540. Anand Natarajan. 609-514-5108.Altech Star Inc. is partnering with Actuate Corporation, a leader inenterprise reporting solutions. Altech focuses on web-enterprise,business intelligence, and strategic outsourcing solutions. Thoughbased at 5 Independence Way, it has offshore services available inChennai, India.For companies with revenues of more than $1 billion, Actuate has anapplication platform to help develop intuitive, Web portal-likereporting and analytic applications that organize information.Top Of PageConsumer Drug SiteStada Pharmaceuticals Inc., 5 Cedar Brook Drive, Cranbury08512. Christian Scheiner, president. 609-409-5999; fax, 609-409-5995.Www.stadausa.comStada Pharmaceuticals has a new website with information on itsRheumatrex drug, which can treat patients with rheumatoid arthritis (www.rheumatrex.info).Patients can learn about diagnostic procedures, available treatments –including drug therapy, diet and exercise – and get answers to commonquestions about the disease.Founded in 1895 as a pharmacists’ cooperative, Stada sells, markets,and distributes more than 300 prescription generic products and overthe counter products, including products originally owned by MovaLaboratory. When Mova was bought by the German firm (StadaArzneimittel AG) a Cleveland subsidiary moved to the current locationin Cranbury.The headquarters is in Bad Vilbel, Germany, and there are 18subsidiaries. The firm contracts manufacturing to leading FDA-approvedmanufacturers in the U.S. and Europe,Top Of PageManagement MovesMercer County Community College, 1200 Old Trenton Road,Box B, Trenton 08690. Robert R. Rose, president. 609-586-4800; fax,609-587-4666. Home page: www.mccc.eduMark McCormick, an attorney who coordinates the paralegal program atMercer County Community College, is the new dean of the college’sBusiness and Technology Division. He succeeds Jacqueline B. Sanders,who had been dean for 17 years. In addition to business programs, thedivision also covers such areas as information technology, funeralservice, aviation, and hotel and restaurant management.A French major at Davidson College in North Carolina, he earned a lawdegree from New York University in 1984, and he has been at MCCC for ayear. At the Community College of Philadelphia, McCormick had builtthe program from 40 students to more than 300. He practices law on apart-time basis in Pennsylvania, focusing on probate and estateplanning. McCormick will launch Mercer’s first online paralegal coursethis fall.Top Of PageETS Sells Capstar, a For-Profit, to ThomsonCapstar LLC, the for-profit subsidiary of Educational Testing Service,has been sold to the Thomson Corporation (TOC) for an undisclosedprice. Capstar’s CEO, Michael J. Fitton, right, will stay with thefirm, which is still expected to move in the near future to AlexanderRoad near the Hyatt Regency. “I am going to be involved in puttingthese companies together to make sure they are leveraged to achievetheir maximum potential,” says Fitton.ETS and Thomson have frequently partnered on bids, and since late lastyear the two companies had been talking about some kind of formalarrangement, either a joint venture or an acquisition.Thomson currently does 90 percent of ETS’s computer-based testdelivery through its subsidiary, Thomson Prometric (which had boughtSylvan Learning). Thomson’s purchase of Capstar will be good for ETS,Fitton says: “Everybody sees this as positive, because ETS and Thomsonhave complimentary services. They do test delivery and administrationbut they don’t have a strong test development and psychometriccapability, which is what we bring to them.”No one need fear for their jobs, and in fact Fitton sees the companyexpanding. “Thomson generated $1 billion in cash last year, and theywant to invest and grow this business,” says Fitton.Headed by Ken Thomson, who is reportedly the richest man in Canada,Thomson is based in Stamford, Connecticut, and has annual revenues ofmore than $7 billion and 38,000 employees. Thomson Prometric(www.prometric.com) is based in Baltimore and has 3,000 employeesworldwide. Thomson owns several other Princeton-based firms, includingPeterson’s with 200 workers on Lenox Drive and eMed Guides, with ahandful of employees on Route 1 North.ETS is the world’s largest private, nonprofit education andmeasurement organization, and though it had a five percent staffreduction in June, it still has about 2,600 employees in the Princetonarea.Capstar was founded in 1996 as an ETS subsidiary, the Chauncey Group,but it can draw on ETS’s three decades of experience in puttingtogether competency assessment, learning, and measurement solutions tocorporations, national associations, and government agencies. Capstardevelops or delivers about 875,000 exams annually, has produced morethan 10,000 hours of E-learning content, and has written hundreds ofbooks with technical content. It currently has 150 employees onRosedale Road and 600 additional workers in Baltimore, Maryland (withiLearning Inc.) and St. Paul, Minnesota (with Experior Assessments).Fitton, 46, is the firm’s third CEO and has been on the board of theChauncey Group (the original spinoff) since it was founded (U.S. 1,October 29). The son of an engineer and a social worker, he majored incomputer science at Rutgers, has a master’s degree from StevensInstitute of Technology, and had a 10-year technical career at Belllabs. Leveraging a lifelong interest in business, he worked for asmall company in New York, then founded a couple of companies,including one that did fixed price systems integration for majorcompanies and one that formed and capitalized companies in thetechnology and real estate markets. Active in real estate, hedeveloped the Sky View Golf Club in Sparta plus the 80 homes thatsurround the club.Although Fitton is restricted by the Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Actfrom talking about specifics, he does say that the workers from ETSand/or Capstar will indeed eventually occupy Alexander Commons, the47,000 square-foot new building at 693 Alexander Road. Originallyscheduled for last January, the move-in date keeps getting pushedback, he says, in part because of redesigned space and the need to getplans approved by the township.Capstar LLC, 664 Rosedale Road, Princeton 08540-0001.Michael Fitton, president & CEO. 609-720-6500; fax, 609-720-6550. Homepage: www.capstarlearning.comNext StoryCorrections or additions?This page is published by PrincetonInfo.com— the web site for U.S. 1 Newspaper in Princeton, New Jersey.
