Cetus Corporation was one of the first biotechnology companies.[1] It was established in Berkeley, California, in 1971, but conducted most of its operations in nearby Emeryville. Before merging with Chiron Corporation in 1991 (now a part of Novartis), it developed several significant pharmaceutical drugs as well as a revolutionary DNA amplification technique.
History
Cetus was founded in 1971 by Ronald E. Cape, Peter Farley, and Nobelist Donald A. Glaser. Its early efforts involved automated methods to select for industrial microorganisms that could produce greater amounts of chemical feedstocks, antibiotics, or vaccine components. By the late 1970s, however, three new revolutionary techniques had been developed: recombinant DNA, monoclonal antibodies, and gene expression, the foundations of the biotechnology industry. In order to enter these new fields, Cetus raised $108 million in an initial public offering (IPO) in 1981, the largest IPO to that date.
Its first large development project, in conjunction with Triton Biosciences, was the successful cloning, expression, modification, and production of beta-interferon