{"id":7370,"date":"2016-07-22T04:00:00","date_gmt":"2016-07-22T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/business.cornell.edu\/centers\/2016\/07\/22\/startup-snapshots-biotech-from-research-to-market-1\/"},"modified":"2026-07-14T18:16:43","modified_gmt":"2026-07-14T18:16:43","slug":"startup-snapshots-biotech-from-research-to-market-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/business.cornell.edu\/centers\/2016\/07\/22\/startup-snapshots-biotech-from-research-to-market-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Startup Snapshots: Biotech from research to market"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Alice Leung, MBA \u201986, Sapientiae<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>by Dick Anderson<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"320\" height=\"320\" src=\"https:\/\/business.cornell.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/06\/startups-Alice-Leung-320x.jpg\" alt=\"Startup Snapshots: Biotech from research to market\" class=\"wp-image-7371\" srcset=\"https:\/\/business.cornell.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/06\/startups-Alice-Leung-320x.jpg 320w, https:\/\/business.cornell.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/06\/startups-Alice-Leung-320x-300x300.jpg 300w, https:\/\/business.cornell.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/06\/startups-Alice-Leung-320x-150x150.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 320px) 100vw, 320px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Alice Leung didn\u2019t develop her new business by today\u2019s rules. Sapientiae, a biotech management consulting firm, has no website, no app, and no real online presence. (\u201cMost of the work I do is confidential,\u201d she explains.) Clients find her by word of mouth, referrals, and a well-connected confederation of experts that she has accrued after more than 25 years in the pharmaceutical industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cScientists often get very excited about the technology, but don\u2019t think through what makes a marketable drug,\u201d Leung says from her office in Oakland, Calif. Working with these young companies, she and her colleagues bring their skills to bear in the long and arduous process of bringing a drug to market, from clinical development and patient advocacy to working with regulatory and reimbursement agencies abroad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Leung\u2019s experience at Johnson \u201ctaught me to break down projects into small pieces,\u201d she says. \u201cSometimes when I work with scientists, I ask \u2018Why wouldn\u2019t you approach it this way?\u2019 They\u2019ve never been taught the ability to walk around a problem to see it from all sides.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Having spent nearly eight years as a CEO (of Intarcia Therapeutics Inc., a biopharmaceutical company), Leung appreciates the flexibility that her consultancy gives her. Her father, 83, a survivor of esophageal cancer, was diagnosed six years ago. \u201cMy parents are six hours away by flight,\u201d she says. \u201cWhen you are a CEO, you are on call 24\/7 and have little leeway for flexibility.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Earlier in her career, Leung worked in oncology development for Bristol Myers Squibb and Berlex, the U.S. subsidiary of Schering AG (now Bayer). With Sapientiae\u2014adapted from the Latin word for wisdom\u2014she still enjoys the \u201cinformation high\u201d of being in the pharmaceutical\/biotech industry: \u201cTo this day, oncology is still closest to my heart.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Alice Leung, MBA \u201986, Sapientiae by Dick Anderson Alice Leung didn\u2019t develop her new business by today\u2019s rules. Sapientiae, a biotech management consulting firm, has no website, no app, and&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":7371,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[171],"tags":[196,201],"ppma_author":[],"class_list":["post-7370","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni-profiles","tag-archived","tag-eii-cornell-startups"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v28.2 (Yoast SEO v28.2) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Startup Snapshots: Biotech from research to market - Cornell Business Centers &amp; Institutes<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Alice Leung, MBA \u201986, Sapientiae by Dick Anderson Alice Leung didn\u2019t develop her new business by today\u2019s rules. Sapientiae, a biotech management\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/business.cornell.edu\/centers\/2016\/07\/22\/startup-snapshots-biotech-from-research-to-market-1\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Startup Snapshots: Biotech from research to market - Cornell Business\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Alice Leung, MBA \u201986, Sapientiae by Dick Anderson Alice Leung didn\u2019t develop her new business by today\u2019s rules. 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