Early History
Chiron (/ˈkaɪˌrɑn/ KY-rɑn after the centaur from Greek mythology) was founded in 1981 by chairman, William J. Rutter, president and chief executive, Professor Edward Penhoet, and vice president for research, Pablo DT Valenzuela. All were academics from the University of California; Penhoet at Berkeley, where he continued to lecture, and the others from San Francisco. Chiron formed a partnership with the Swiss pharmaceutical giant, Ciba-Geigy Ltd., through the Biocine Company, to use genetic engineering to develop vaccines and to treat, prevent and diagnose diseases such as AIDS, herpes and malaria. Other partnerships included Thicon Inc. to develop a growth factor hormone for the treatment of wounds and Merck & Co to develop an improvement to their existing hepatitis B vaccine. In 1986, Professor Penhoet said: "Our business strategy is to dominate small markets rather than take a small presence in a broad market." The niche that Chiron was focusing on was ophthalmology, which Mr. Penhoet said was "big enough to be interesting, but small enough to service with 40 salespeople." Professor Penhoet also stated that Chiron was set up to provide the enabling technology for others to use under license, and later saying that Chiron was "as close to a virtual corporation as you can be", with few fixed assets but more relationships.
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