Shifting Gears: ProfitPlus Planet - The Paul Merage School of ...

BEYOND THE CLASSROOM BEYOND THE CLASSROOM
24
experience INNOVATION
Riding the
Entrepreneurial Wave
Prior to entering the
Merage School as a
Fully Employed MBA
student, Aric Plumley
’08, had already
started his own engineering
design firm.
He still runs that business today,
but he also serves as project manager
for WaveTec Vision Systems,
Inc., a start-up company in the
healthcare arena.
“I’ve always been attracted to
entrepreneurial endeavors,” said
Plumley. “My own business allowed
me to explore consulting, which is
something I do enjoy, however the
job I have at WaveTec better matches
my personality.”
Plumley’s relationship with
WaveTec was bolstered by another
Merage School alumnus and fellow
ALUMNI BUSINESSES
Sustaining a Competitive Advantage
by Anne Warde
surfer, Tom Berryman, EMBA ’88.
At the time of Plumley’s hire,
Berryman was the president and
CEO of WaveTec, a role he recently
relinquished in pursuit of other
entrepreneurial ventures. Hired as a
senior mechanical engineer, Plumley
was soon promoted to project manager
responsible for WaveTec’s
premier product, the ORange ®
Intraoperative Wavefront Aberrometer,
a device used to measure the optical
power of a human eye. ORange,
which launched in the United States
in April 2009, is scheduled to go
worldwide by early 2012.
“WaveTec has provided me with
the opportunity to meld my entrepreneurial
drive with my medical
engineering experience. It’s a position
that gives me the best of both
worlds,” said Plumley. “I couldn’t
have gotten into this role without
my MBA. It opened doors for me
and gave me skills, particularly in
organizational behavior, that have
been invaluable to me as an entrepreneur.”
Plumley continued, “In
addition, the product that I have
been working on and that we have
now launched assists physicians
with cataract procedures and
improves patient outcomes. That, in
and of itself, is satisfying.”
Plumley has more than 15 years
of experience in product development
and entrepreneurship. He has
worked in a variety of industries
including semiconductor, medical
device, aerospace, and consumer
product. WaveTec Vision is a privately
held company and a leader in
intraoperative wavefront measurement
technology for refractive
cataract surgeons.
Fighting Counterfeit
Medicine
With a mission to stop counterfeit
medicine, Sarah Hine
’05, along with
Nathan Sigworth
and Taylor
Thompson, founded
PharmaSecure in
2007. Based in India,
PharmaSecure uses SMS text messaging
and special product coding
labels to determine the authenticity
of medications.
“We label each unit of medicine
with a unique code,” explained
Hine. “When the medication is purchased,
the consumer can send the
code, via SMS text message, to a
PharmaSecure number and instantly
receive authentication letting
them know whether their medicine
is genuine.
“The problem with counterfeit
medicines is that they may or may
not contain active pharmaceutical
ingredients. Even worse, they may
contain partial or low levels which
can create a resistance to medication
altogether, and in some cases
can even cause death,” said Hine.
On a worldwide basis, counterfeit
medications are responsible
for thousands of deaths and contribute
to the development of
drug-resistant strains of disease.
In addition, counterfeit products
are costing pharmaceutical companies
upwards of $75 billion
dollars per year. In some countries,
like India and Africa, as
much as 40% of high-value drugs
are counterfeited.
“PharmaSecure’s technology
empowers consumers to authenticate
the medicines they buy. There
is a significant social need for this
service and a huge potential for
growth,” said Hine. “Our business is
just getting started and already we
anticipate revenue this year. Next
year we should become a self-sustaining
company.”
Hine credits her ability to build
PharmaSecure in part to her MBA
education. “Having my MBA enabled
me to lead a company. It gave me a
good foundation. Starting this company
was almost a second MBA. I
really enjoy the challenge, but it’s a
steep learning curve. I love the
lifestyle and travel, and I get to
meet really interesting people.”
Hine added, “Operating in the
social enterprise space is rewarding.
We are meeting the needs of
consumers and businesses alike. I
hope to stay in this space and even
open another social enterprise.”
A Hot House of
Innovation
Founded by Tony Page and Daniel
Vesely, XIQ is a virtual hot house for
innovation. A family of entrepreneurial
business, XIQ is siphoning
off some of the best and brightest
entrepreneurial-minded Merage
School MBAs, and providing young
entrepreneurs with the environment
they need to grow.
“Entrepreneurs come to us with
their ideas. If what they have to
offer sounds viable, we enter into a
partnership of sorts where we supply
foundation level support –
human resources, accounting, office
space, etc. – to enable these entrepreneurs
to establish and grow their
dream,” said Page.
Under the XIQ umbrella, a
variety of young businesses are
sprouting, including: BioLink, a
recruiting organization; LNX
Pharma, a social network analysis
company run by Philip Topham, a
UC Irvine alumnus and member
of the Merage School Dean’s
Leadership Circle; and Reimburse -
ment IQ, a reimbursement strategy
consulting firm.
HealthIQ, another of the XIQ
companies, was founded in 1985
and is the genesis of the XIQ family.
The business was purchased by
Page and Vesely in 2000, when the
two took over management, and it
was the only business they ran until
2004. The employer of many
Merage School alumni, Health IQ
was the launching point for Dao Vo
’01. Vo started as an
intern with HealthIQ
and is now general
manager of her own
endeavor,
PharmaVoxx, a
marketing and
competitive analysis company.
“The Merage School gave me the
building blocks and product development
expertise to manage my
own business. Tony and Daniel gave
me the freedom and support to
enable me to establish and make it
grow,” said Vo. “I started
PharmaVoxx with a vision of delivering
market intelligence to clients
seeking competitive knowledge
about pharmaceutical communications
to the healthcare and patient
community,” said Vo. “It’s a niche
market, one with a tremendous
amount of potential.”
Vo’s vision appears to be on target.
While still in its infancy,
PharmaVoxx is showing real signs
of growth. With only six employees,
the company has already
expanded to India where much of
the data entry work takes place,
and plans are underway to pursue
companies outside of the pharmaceutical
industry.
Currently XIQ and its family of
businesses have about 35 full-time
current employees of whom eight
are Merage School alums. “Since
the company’s formation 12 years
ago, the percentage of employees
who have been Merage School
alumni has always been significant,”
said Page, “We definitely
“Think Merage First.”
25
Merage | 2010 – 2011