An Innovative, High Quality and Safe, Integrated Service
Acter was established in 1979 and is headquartered in Taichung City, Taiwan. The scope of our service includes turnkey engineering projects, cleanroom engineering, biomedical engineering, energy technology services, air-conditioning and electromechanical engineering etc.
As biomedical engineering is associated with people’s dignity and quality of life, Acter has followed both regulatory updates (GMP, cGMP, PICS and FDA) and international trends, to pursue innovative and safely integrated services of the highest quality.
With our abundant practical experience and professional skills, the Acter team provides clients with strategic solutions, in order to quickly and flexibly satisfy our customers’ demands.
We also offer new construction methods and value engineering, in order to assist our customers in reducing their construction costs. Under strict quality management and with safety of paramount importance, Acter not only completes the projects as scheduled, but also offers great value to our clients.
Starting out in Taiwan, Acter’s service locations have expanded throughout Asia. We are successfully cultivating the Chinese Market, while also advancing into Southeast Asia.
Acter provides total solution services to many of the biggest firms in the biomedical industry, including PharmaEssentia, Pfizer, Adimmune, ScinoPharm and Medigen.
Acter will continue to operate as the most reliable partner to our clients, by integrating the supply chain, pursuing sustainable excellence and ensuring success for all parties.
Landing the government on side was imperative to provide assurance to private investors and, consequently, PharmaEssentia was able to secure an additional 60 per cent of funding. Markets, such as manufacturing, usually produce a result in three to five years, but in biotech, it can take 10 to 15 years, at least, before you can expect to see any sort of return. Ko-Chung and his co-founders were certain they had the talent and ingenuity to bring PharmaEssentia to life.
The company is committed to the improvement of health and quality of life for patients suffering from diseases such as myeloproliferative neoplasms, hepatitis and the like, working from a world-class cGMP biologics facility in Taichung. It has even developed a game-changing drug candidate called Ropeginterferon alfa-2b (P1101) to treat blood cancers, such as Polycythemia Vera. Additionally, the company was also granted the rights from business partner Kinex to sell Oraxol in certain Asian countries – an oral formulation of paclitaxel, a chemotherapy agent commonly used in firstline treatment for breast cancer. PharmaEssentia has found that Oraxol dramatically reduces the side effects experienced with paclitaxel, and Ko-Chung and his team are exploring the drug in relation to breast cancer – the leading cause of cancer death in women.
Currently, PharmaEssentia has three different discoveries on the go from its biotech park, with more innovative research in the pipeline. The Taiwanese government created this firstclass national biotech park to support this expansion, with Ko-Chung masterminding a strategy to increase their market volume, predicted to succeed in three to five years.
“We are working on a conceptual design for new-style manufacture, which we hope will be up and running in the next five years, ready to expand into Japan, China and the U.S.,” says Ko-Chung. “We are preparing to launch into more profitable biotech, working with talent from all over the world.”
Such epic plans do not come without
“We are preparing to launch into more profitable biotech, working with talent “from all over the world
challenges, with staffing a leading cause for concern. Finding skilled people is not easy, since PharmaEssentia is already one of the pioneers and leading companies in Taiwan and requires the finest minds in their field. Ko-Chung recognizes the need for the company to train its own talent, which takes time, alongside hiring overseas staff to educate local workers.
China is also a looming issue, as it catches up on the technology and pays vast sums to poach manpower from Taiwan. Plus, it is improving its performance, where previously it was more focused on discovery and development.
Challenging
Another delicate area of the business is the supply chain, something that is particularly important within the pharma infrastructure. This includes supply chain for materials. According to Ko-Chung, these aren’t too hard to source as they use “quite standard materials,” imported from Europe, Japan and also locally.
“The most challenging issue for us is clinical studies in Europe, USA, China, Korea and Japan. When we supply small quantities to hospitals, it’s manageable. But once we launch the product proper and take it to market for commercial use, the quantity and quality becomes trickier to manage,” says Ko-Chung. “Strategic supplier relationships are key.”
As PharmaEssentia tackles its next phase of growth, and transitions from a predominantly R and D company to an operating business, the onus will be on these partners to deliver more than ever before, helping the company continue its ground-breaking work. As Ko-Chung notes:
“People are passionate about this work and doing good, which helps to make everyone incredibly focused and driven.”
With decades of experience in the industry, as well as the positive results to show for it, KoChung and his team look set to be making a real difference in people’s lives for many years to come.