CACS 2020 Webinar

Speaker: Joe Chen, Ph.D., Fox Rothschild, LLP

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is an ongoing global health emergency. This presentation will review pathogenesis of SARS-CoV-2 as well as therapeutics and vaccines for preventing or treating COVID-19. This presentation will also outline the considerations associated with patenting biologics such as vaccines.

Joe has a particularly diverse scientific background and advanced degrees in biology, chemistry and computer science. He has more than a decade of experience in drug discovery and development, in both academic and industrial settings. Formerly a research fellow at a Fortune 500 pharmaceutical company, Joe directly contributed to multiple inventions of novel clinical candidates and played key roles in advancing three preclinical programs into clinical stages. The therapeutic areas that he has worked on include oncology, inflammation, cardiovascular, neuroscience and infectious diseases.

He is well versed in medicinal chemistry, organic chemistry, nanomaterials, molecular biology, biochemistry, cell biology, immunology, neurology and pharmacology.  He also has extensive experience in pharmaceuticals, therapeutic protein engineering and production, antibody and vaccine development and medical diagnostics.

Speaker: Gerry Norton, Ph.D., J.D., Partner at Fox Rothschild, LLP

(1) How To Protect A Company’s IP Assets From Being Stolen; 

(2) How To Comply With Rules And Regulations Dealing With Protecting Company Trade Secrets.

Gerry is Managing Partner of the firm's Princeton office and has extensive experience litigating complex matters pertaining to patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets and breach of contract.  Prior to joining Fox Rothschild, Gerry was a named partner of an intellectual property law firm in New Jersey, and was an attorney for 10 years at Rogers & Wells and at Clifford Chance in New York. He held a post-doctoral fellowship with Merck, Inc.

Speaker: Shoufeng Li, Ph.D., Aucta Pharmaceuticals 

In this talk, its founder and CEO, Dr. Shoufeng Li, will speak about his experience in starting and building the company, including idea conception, building team and pipeline, learn and grow in areas outside of one’s own comfort zone, partnering.  He will also talk about the current environment between U.S. and China and how having business on both sides would need to navigate.  Most importantly, management philosophy is what drives long term growth and sustainability of a company, special emphasis will be discussed on that topic as well.  

It is the speakers wish that some of the topics and discussion will be of help for those who are looking to branch out into other areas other than scientific area, and for those who are looking to tap into the growth of healthcare industry in China leveraging on their Chinese heritage.  

Dr. Shoufeng Li is  CEO of Aucta Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a research and technology based pharmaceutical company focusing on the development and commercialization of niche generic and branded specialty products. The company’s corporate strategy is to focus on proven molecules, and, through innovation, create new therapeutics with lower scientific risk that fulfill unmet medical needs. Aucta’s specialty division has a therapeutic focus in CNS, Dermatology, and Pediatrics.

Prior to founding Aucta Pharmaceuticals, Dr. Li is Director, Technical Project Leader at Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corporation at East Hanover, NJ, where he managed a multidisciplinary project teams, he was responsible for late phase project management and represent CMC function in global project team (GPT).  Dr. Li has close to 20 years of multi-national industrial product development experience in both small start-up and multi-national corporations.  

Dr. Li's interest and area of expertise is in 505(b)(2) product development and in vitro - in vivo correlation, he has been instrumental in overcoming multiple difficult to formulate bioequivalent products during his tenure at Novartis and was awarded Novartis Leading Scientist in 2007.  He has been invited speakers in international forum for multiple occasions, and has over 30 peer reviewed research articles, reviews and patents.  Dr. Li holds Ph.D. in Pharmaceutics and M.S. in Statistics from Rutgers University.  He has been actively involved professionally in AAPS, SAPA and BayHelix. 

Speaker: Patrick Wong, CPA, Partner of WWC, P.C.

Patrick will provide an overview of equity set-up basics for new start-ups including different legal business entity options. How to set up founders, employees, and investors’ Equity to work with potential investors and talent people. Introduction of different finance options and IPO considering company exit strategy.  

Patrick Wong is a partner of WWC CPA P.C. He specializes in auditing, IPSs and cross-border capital market transactions for companies in the US and China. Patrick was the CFO of a public technology company listed in the US. He has held various senior roles in finance and sales with technology companies and financial institutions. He is a Chartered Account of Canada, and Certified Public Accountant of the US, Hong Kong and Australia.