March 12, 2007 | Five years ago, the inaugural issue of Bio•IT World featured a series of introductory interviews with the key executives and evangelists of 60 companies, enabling industry legends and rookie entrepreneurs alike to share their views on the bio-IT industry (see Champions of Bio-IT, March 2002). To mark our 5th anniversary, we offer the 2007 remix — Champions 2.0! We invited senior executives from 50 outstanding technology providers to answer a few simple questions. Here was their chance to reflect on their company's survival, their latest technology offerings, and their prospects looking ahead.
On the following pages, we feature the complete set of unedited answers for all our Champions.We use the term "Champions" as much in the sense of "advocate, fighter, and defender" as "winner." And for good reason, since of the companies featured in our first issue, 25 percent (and many more faces) have disappeared or changed. Several others are struggling to overcome ongoing challenges facing platform and tool providers.
A marked change in 2007 is the appearance of a number of eClinical companies, a field Bio•IT World now covers in depth, and key partners in expediting the passage of safe drugs. Microsoft, absent five years ago, not only appears but also is cited by several other executives for the expanding influence of its BioIT Alliance.
A couple of caveats: first and foremost, we do not claim this to be a scientific survey, merely illustrative of companies that are succeeding in their respective sectors, or that appear poised to do so. We should also note that a handful of companies we approached declined to participate, citing time constraints or other factors.
Our thanks to all of the executives for their time and cooperation. We trust we will see them — and you — in five years.
Allison Proffitt
Kevin Davies
Computing / IT Infrastructure
Abrevity — Joel Harrison, CTO
Active Motif — Christopher Hoover, TimeLogic Product Manager; Darryl Leon, AKS Product Manager
Adobe Systems Inc. — Melonie Warfel, Director WW Standards & Life Sciences
Apple Computer — Elizabeth Kerr, Director, Science and Technology Markets, Worldwide Pro Markets
BlueArc Corporation — James Reaney, Director, Research Markets
EMC Corporation — Roberta Katz, Director, Global Solutions Lead, Healthcare-Life Sciences
HP — Harry Kim, Director WW Health and Life Sciences
IBM — Michael Svinte, Vice President, Global Innovation, IBM Healthcare and Life Sciences
Isilon Systems -- Sujal Patel, Founder & CTO
Infosys — Eric Paternoster, Head, Life Sciences Business Unit
Microsoft — Don Rule, Platform Strategy Advisor
Oracle Corporation — Mychelle Mowrey, Vice President for Global Health Industries
Penguin Computing — Pauline Nist, Senior Vice President, Product Development & Management
SGI — Eng Lim Goh, Chief Technology Officer
Sun Microsystems — Joerg Schwarz, Director, Healthcare and Life Sciences
Informatics / Data Management
Accelrys — Mark Emkjer, President and CEO
CambridgeSoft — Michael Tomasic, Chairman, President, and CEO
Elsevier MDL — Lars Barfod, President and CEO
GenoLogics — Michael Ball, CEO
InforSense — Yike Guo, CEO and Founder
LabVantage Solutions — Jim Aurelio, President and CEO
SAS — Ed Helton, Chief Pharmaceutical and Regulatory Scientist
Spotfire — Christopher Ahlberg, Founder and CEO
The MathWorks — Jim Tung, MathWorks Fellow
Symyx — Isy Goldwasser, President
Clinical Trials Technology
ClinPhone — Steve Kent, CEO
Cognos — Bill Stevens, Senior Director, Life Sciences Solutions
Etrials Worldwide — John Cline, CEO
Nextrials — James Rogers, President and CEO
Phase Forward — Bob Weiler, President and CEO
Phoenix Data Systems — Bill Claypool, CEO
Knowledge Mining
Entelos — James Karis, President and CEO
Genstruct — Keith Elliston, President and CEO
Ingenuity — Jake Leschly, President and CEO; Ramon Feliciano, CTO and Vice President of Research
Insightful — Michael O’Connell, Director of Life Science Solutions
Pharsight — Shawn O’Connor, President and CEO
GNS — Colin Hill, CEO and Co-founder
GeneGo — Tatiana Nikolskaya, President and Founder, CSO
Linguamatics — Roger Hale, COO
Genomics / Proteomics
454 Life Sciences — Christopher McLeod, President and CEO
Agilent Technologies — Chris van Ingen, Senior Vice President
Applied Biosystems — Dennis Gilbert, Chief Scientific Officer
Caliper Life Sciences — Kevin Hrusovsky, President and CEO
Illumina — Jay Flatley, President and CEO
Thermo Fisher Scientific — Marc Casper, Executive Vice President
Bruker Daltonics — Herbert Thiele, Worldwide Head of Bioinformatics
Geospiza — Rob Arnold, President
Teranode — Joseph Duncan, CEO
Nanosphere — William Moffitt, President and CEO