For a man whose doctoral work was in the complex fields of molecular cancer research and bioinformatics, Jeff Spitzner, PhD, president and chief science officer of Amperand, Ltd., used a deceptively simple three-step formula to select a name for his new company: it had to be easy to spell, it had to have a story and it had to start with a letter from the beginning of the alphabet. “It puts you at the top of the lineup when your company appears on a list with other companies,” said Spitzner in support of this proven marketing strategy – used since publication of the first Yellow Pages directory in 1886. In explaining his new company’s story, he added, “Amperand stands for ‘amplify electronic research and development.’”

Spitzner came from a science background, but soon discovered that he enjoyed the intersection of business and technology. “Academics is great training, but it is confining, so after my postdoctoral research at MIT, I came back to Columbus, Ohio to start new technology companies, help other companies grow and start new ventures in healthcare IT,” he said. With more than 20 years of experience as a founder and executive of scientific software and biotechnology companies, Spitzner is a recognized leader in electronic lab notebooks (ELNs), bioinformatics, knowledge management and scientific research. He was named the Technology Executive of the Year at the 2011 Innovation Awards.

Launching Amperand in 2012, Spitzner now works with start-ups and existing companies needing assistance with business strategy and guidance in bringing new technology to the commercial marketplace. Amperand helps companies form new products, develop sales and marketing strategies and assists them in finding strategic partners to help finance or distribute their products.
“Many inventors believe that because they have the best technology, they are going to be successful. That would be great if it were true, but the key is in understanding what the market wants, how to present it to the market and how to present it in terms of problems that customers want to pay for to solve,” he said.

Currently, Spitzner is very excited about Amperand’s collaboration with The Ohio State University regarding a new healthcare information technology, and Signet Enterprises to fund its commercialization. “We will soon announce this new company (codename ‘Signet Accel’) being created to provide big data management for improving healthcare and healthcare research,” he said. 

While individual inventions in the life sciences can make for great news, Spitzner acknowledges that the real advances often take place behind the scenes, and are more complicated. “The advancement and integration of healthcare and life sciences – combined with information technology, bioinformatics and big data – will create what I call the ‘biotechnology revolution,’” he said. Spitzner predicts that this revolution will “shake things up” even more than the information technology revolution. “Ultimately, it’s going to transform healthcare, computing, energy and new product creations that will help drive the economy, change our quality of life and change our communities for the better and forever.”

For more information, visit: www.amperand.com