Althea offers cGMP plasmid production, protein production, formulation and filling services. Plasmid DNA and protein production are offered using both Althea’s industry-leading manufacturing process as well as client developed processes. A range of options are available for formulation and filling services ranging from semi- automated to fully- automated processes for vials and syringes. Althea is focused on offering highly responsive customer service, flexible scheduling, and rapid turnaround times to meet the requirements of both early stage clinical programs and commercial programs alike.
People to watch: Magda Marquet
Company : Althea Technologies
Position : Co-president and co-CEO
Education : Ph.D. in biochemical engineering
Age : 46
Magda Marquet , who co-founded Althea Technologies with her husband, Francois Ferre , has more than 20 years experience in biotechnology in the United States and Europe . She was formerly executive director of pharmaceutical development at the San Diego company Vical. Before that, she worked at Amylin Pharmaceuticals, Protein Polymer Technologies, Syntro Corporation and Transgene. Althea provides contract services to the biotech and pharmaceutical industries.
Why does your company exist?
Developing a new drug takes over 10 years and over $1 billion, and it continually becomes more complex and expensive. Meanwhile, we are all talking about personalized medicine, which would require a very fast and highly economical development model for new drugs. Althea Technologies plays a significant role in decreasing time, complexity and cost in bringing new therapies to market by providing innovative services and technologies to the biopharmaceutical industry. At the heart of Althea is the passion that my husband and I share for improving the efficiency of biopharmaceutical development.
What about your job keeps you up at night?
As a service organization, we have a diverse customer base with highly individualized needs ranging from discovery to full biopharmaceutical production. Consistently meeting and exceeding the customer's expectations is a commitment of Althea and a daily challenge. It's a lot of juggling to aggressively pursue our research goals and at the same time, to grow our revenues and profitability.
What about your job do you brag about?
I am proud of having started and grown a successful company that provides solutions in biopharmaceutical development. Althea reached profitability in less than two years, which is quite unique in this field. At the end of the day, it's all about relationships. It's very rewarding to create a solid organization where people can grow and contribute, to collaborate with investigators that have a true mission in developing new cancer or HIV vaccines or to serve our customers to make their life easier.
What is the biggest challenge facing your company?
Althea Technologies has experienced over 1,000 percent growth in the last five years. Maintaining an aggressive growth rate is definitely a challenge. I think the biggest challenge facing Althea Technologies is to continue to anticipate the needs of drug development and offer innovative solutions in this field.
Tell us something interesting about yourself.
I was born in the Principality of Andorra, which is one of the smallest countries in the world. I have two wonderful teenage sons who are great teachers and continuously remind me of what is truly important in life. My husband and I came to San Diego 18 years ago with the intention of exploring career opportunities in the burgeoning field of biotechnology. We were truly amazed by the possibilities that San Diego had to offer at the time, and it has been very rewarding to be part of the tremendous growth of the San Diego life sciences industry over the last two decades.
Althea Technologies
A leading provider of contract services to
the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries
11040 Roselle Street | San Diego, CA 92121-1205
Toll-free 1-888-4ALTHEA
info@altheatech.com