John Gastaldo / Union-Tribune
Last year, biochemist Tina Nova sold Genoptix, the Carlsbad genomics testing company she co-founded in 1999, for $475 million to Novartis, making Nova a legend in the rarefied world of women at the top of U.S. science and business.
“Although the Genoptix employees made money at the acquisition,” says Nova, “our investors (led by Dr. Drew Senyei of Enterprise Partners in La Jolla) took the risk.” Enterprise turned pennies into an initial IPO share offering of some $45.
But the wider world has only recently been introduced to companies like Genoptix after actress Angelina Jolie underwent a double mastectomy. Genomics testing indicated that Jolie’s odds of getting breast cancer were as high as 86 percent.
“That was a shocker,” says Nova. “I give her tremendous credit for going public, a woman that private.”
Nova says the Jolie experience is the medical wave of the future: companion diagnostics, matching a gene marker for a specific cancer to a drug that may help or cure the patient, or indicate surgery.
If the patient is shown to possess a gene like HER2 and KS67 — both biomarkers for breast cancer — for instance, or in the case of Jolie, the BRCA1 and BRCA2 gene, treatment is indicated. (The U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled that Myriad, a genomics company in Salt Lake City, could not own the patent on the actual genes.) Genoptix has a novel method for testing for HER2 that is more dependable and more easily reproduced than other tests, says Nova. If a woman tests positive for the HER2 gene, she can then be given the drug Herceptin.
In her 20s, Nova, a biochemist with a doctorate from UC Riverside, patented an important component of the PSA test for prostate cancer — how to stabilize the molecules — while working at the seminal San Diego biotech Hybritech, her first job. “I knew a lot about purifying molecules. I had a skill set and I tried it and it worked.” She was awarded the munificent bonus of $100. The PSA test made hundreds of millions of dollars for Hybritech and its successors, Eli Lilly and Beckman, and is still widely used.
“You don’t go into science for the money,” explains Nova, 60. “You go into science because you love it and you want to help people and change the world.”
As Hybritech blended into the big pharma culture of Lilly, Nova missed the entrepreneurial spirit. “It was crazy how much they let us do at Hybritech, science, manufacturing, helping with marketing. We didn’t know what ‘biotech’ meant. It meant get in there and get the job done.” She moved to Ligand, working on the steroid receptor test, which was licensed from the Evans laboratory at the Salk Institute. She then became president at Nanogen for seven years, learning “the business” side of science, preparing to go out on her own.
Nova believes some young executives push too hard and too fast to get to be CEO, and they crash and burn. “You need to be able to push, but you have to be thoughtful, too, running a company.”
Her “aha moment” in the formation of Genoptix came when Nova and her partners asked doctors and hospitals how they liked their testing. Fine, except for oncology, or cancer results, said doctors. So Nova, starting in one room, decided what was needed was not just testing as with the more-straightforward PSA but actual diagnosis. When the patient returns to his own doctor, he could, ideally, begin treatment. Genoptix now has more than 40 oncological pathologists on staff, some 700 employees, and is one of the largest users of FedEx in Southern California.
Success for Nova herself comes from sheer force of personality, she believes.
“If you don’t love what you do, every day, you will not succeed,” she says. “That’s what success is all about, loving what you do. I love what I do. I love getting up in the morning. I love going to work. I can hardly wait.”
The daughter and granddaughter of Greek immigrants in the Central Valley farming town of Delano, Nova was the first in her family to go to college. “I was never the smartest kid in class, not one of those naturally brilliant students, but I usually finished first, even if I had to study twice as hard.”
She remembers success as beginning on top of a blue tractor in her father’s hay fields. She and her sister were up at 5 on weekends and every summer morning raking fields and stacking hay. “My sister would complain, ‘what’s the point?’ but I made sure my rows were straight.” They were paid $1 an hour, and Nova learned to think twice about buying anything for $10, a day’s wages.
Her grandparents lived next door. “When I saw that movie, ‘My Big Fat Greek Wedding,’ I was on the floor laughing. I mean, my life was about that wacky. I told my grandparents I might want to go to college and they said, ‘Why?’ I said I liked science. Finally, my dad said, ‘OK. Your husband may die and you will still have a job, and you’ll have a better job because you went to college.’ I said, ‘Perfect!’ That was my way of getting out of there.”
There were no chemistry classes at Delano Joint Union High, no such thing as physics. When she was admitted to UC Irvine, she called her parents, crying. “Give it another month,” they said. Soon she was the only girl in honors chemistry, on her way to a Ph.D.
“I’ve always been the kind of person, if you say, ‘No,’ I say, ‘Watch me!’ I find especially with women, and I still see it today, if someone says, ‘no, you can’t do that,’ they stop much easier, and it’s a confidence thing, whereas I see that men are not discouraged so easily. I’m a big believer in, ‘you can do anything you want to do. If you have the drive, you just have to do it.’ At Genoptix, when I interview people, I’ll often take the passion over the ‘A.’ You have to want it!”
Way back at Delano High, Nova once signed up for mechanical drawing. “But you haven’t taken home economics,” the counselor said. “All they do in home-ec,” said Nova, “is make rock-hard cinnamon buns and I’m not good at that. I hate ’em!” When the mechanical drawing teacher told her only boys were allowed in the class, she asked, “How am I going to be an architect if I don’t know how to draw?” “OK,” said the teacher, finally, “but you have to sit right in the front, and you can’t bother the boys.”
“Well,” says Nova, “They gave me a special chair surrounded by the boys, and I’ve been bothering the boys ever since!”
About the old patent for the PSA test? Nova keeps it, framed, inside a drawer in her desk.
“When I was younger, the boys wanted my phone number,” she jokes, “but now the men ask me about their PSA number.”
Sara Pennebaker, of the UCSD biochemistry department, and Elizabeth Li contributed research to this column. Steve Chapple’s Intellectual Capital covers game-changing people, ideas and perspectives. He can be reached at intellectualcapitalchapple@gmail.com
“Although the Genoptix employees made money at the acquisition,” says Nova, “our investors (led by Dr. Drew Senyei of Enterprise Partners in La Jolla) took the risk.” Enterprise turned pennies into an initial IPO share offering of some $45.
But the wider world has only recently been introduced to companies like Genoptix after actress Angelina Jolie underwent a double mastectomy. Genomics testing indicated that Jolie’s odds of getting breast cancer were as high as 86 percent.
“That was a shocker,” says Nova. “I give her tremendous credit for going public, a woman that private.”
Nova says the Jolie experience is the medical wave of the future: companion diagnostics, matching a gene marker for a specific cancer to a drug that may help or cure the patient, or indicate surgery.
If the patient is shown to possess a gene like HER2 and KS67 — both biomarkers for breast cancer — for instance, or in the case of Jolie, the BRCA1 and BRCA2 gene, treatment is indicated. (The U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled that Myriad, a genomics company in Salt Lake City, could not own the patent on the actual genes.) Genoptix has a novel method for testing for HER2 that is more dependable and more easily reproduced than other tests, says Nova. If a woman tests positive for the HER2 gene, she can then be given the drug Herceptin.
In her 20s, Nova, a biochemist with a doctorate from UC Riverside, patented an important component of the PSA test for prostate cancer — how to stabilize the molecules — while working at the seminal San Diego biotech Hybritech, her first job. “I knew a lot about purifying molecules. I had a skill set and I tried it and it worked.” She was awarded the munificent bonus of $100. The PSA test made hundreds of millions of dollars for Hybritech and its successors, Eli Lilly and Beckman, and is still widely used.
“You don’t go into science for the money,” explains Nova, 60. “You go into science because you love it and you want to help people and change the world.”
As Hybritech blended into the big pharma culture of Lilly, Nova missed the entrepreneurial spirit. “It was crazy how much they let us do at Hybritech, science, manufacturing, helping with marketing. We didn’t know what ‘biotech’ meant. It meant get in there and get the job done.” She moved to Ligand, working on the steroid receptor test, which was licensed from the Evans laboratory at the Salk Institute. She then became president at Nanogen for seven years, learning “the business” side of science, preparing to go out on her own.
Nova believes some young executives push too hard and too fast to get to be CEO, and they crash and burn. “You need to be able to push, but you have to be thoughtful, too, running a company.”
Her “aha moment” in the formation of Genoptix came when Nova and her partners asked doctors and hospitals how they liked their testing. Fine, except for oncology, or cancer results, said doctors. So Nova, starting in one room, decided what was needed was not just testing as with the more-straightforward PSA but actual diagnosis. When the patient returns to his own doctor, he could, ideally, begin treatment. Genoptix now has more than 40 oncological pathologists on staff, some 700 employees, and is one of the largest users of FedEx in Southern California.
Success for Nova herself comes from sheer force of personality, she believes.
“If you don’t love what you do, every day, you will not succeed,” she says. “That’s what success is all about, loving what you do. I love what I do. I love getting up in the morning. I love going to work. I can hardly wait.”
The daughter and granddaughter of Greek immigrants in the Central Valley farming town of Delano, Nova was the first in her family to go to college. “I was never the smartest kid in class, not one of those naturally brilliant students, but I usually finished first, even if I had to study twice as hard.”
She remembers success as beginning on top of a blue tractor in her father’s hay fields. She and her sister were up at 5 on weekends and every summer morning raking fields and stacking hay. “My sister would complain, ‘what’s the point?’ but I made sure my rows were straight.” They were paid $1 an hour, and Nova learned to think twice about buying anything for $10, a day’s wages.
Her grandparents lived next door. “When I saw that movie, ‘My Big Fat Greek Wedding,’ I was on the floor laughing. I mean, my life was about that wacky. I told my grandparents I might want to go to college and they said, ‘Why?’ I said I liked science. Finally, my dad said, ‘OK. Your husband may die and you will still have a job, and you’ll have a better job because you went to college.’ I said, ‘Perfect!’ That was my way of getting out of there.”
There were no chemistry classes at Delano Joint Union High, no such thing as physics. When she was admitted to UC Irvine, she called her parents, crying. “Give it another month,” they said. Soon she was the only girl in honors chemistry, on her way to a Ph.D.
“I’ve always been the kind of person, if you say, ‘No,’ I say, ‘Watch me!’ I find especially with women, and I still see it today, if someone says, ‘no, you can’t do that,’ they stop much easier, and it’s a confidence thing, whereas I see that men are not discouraged so easily. I’m a big believer in, ‘you can do anything you want to do. If you have the drive, you just have to do it.’ At Genoptix, when I interview people, I’ll often take the passion over the ‘A.’ You have to want it!”
Way back at Delano High, Nova once signed up for mechanical drawing. “But you haven’t taken home economics,” the counselor said. “All they do in home-ec,” said Nova, “is make rock-hard cinnamon buns and I’m not good at that. I hate ’em!” When the mechanical drawing teacher told her only boys were allowed in the class, she asked, “How am I going to be an architect if I don’t know how to draw?” “OK,” said the teacher, finally, “but you have to sit right in the front, and you can’t bother the boys.”
“Well,” says Nova, “They gave me a special chair surrounded by the boys, and I’ve been bothering the boys ever since!”
About the old patent for the PSA test? Nova keeps it, framed, inside a drawer in her desk.
“When I was younger, the boys wanted my phone number,” she jokes, “but now the men ask me about their PSA number.”
Sara Pennebaker, of the UCSD biochemistry department, and Elizabeth Li contributed research to this column. Steve Chapple’s Intellectual Capital covers game-changing people, ideas and perspectives. He can be reached at intellectualcapitalchapple@gmail.com
