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Technology and the Internet

The founder and chairman of Quidel, a...

By CHRIS KRAUL
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The founder and chairman of Quidel, a La Jolla-based biotechnology firm, has resigned to pursue research full time, the company said Tuesday.

David Katz, who has also been chief scientific officer at closely held Quidel since founding the company in 1981, will devote his energies to Medical Biology Institute, a nonprofit research group in La Jolla that is closely allied with Quidel. Quidel funds research at MBI in exchange for commercial rights to technology developed.

A successor to Katz may not be chosen for several months, President Joseph Stemler said.

Quidel makes a line of monoclonal antibody-based diagnostic kits for ovulation, pregnancy and allergies. The company is also trying to develop a line of therapeutic products for allergies and for diseases, including lupus.

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Quidel posted a loss on sales of about $7 million in 1987. “We’re spending 100% of sales on research,” Stemler said.

Since its founding, Quidel has had an accumulated deficit of $29 million while raising about $47 million in venture capital.

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Chris Kraul

Chris Kraul covered South America for the Los Angeles Times from his base in Bogota, Colombia. He joined the paper in 1987 and was business editor of the San Diego edition until it closed in 1992. He then began covering the border and Mexican economies until his assignment to The Times’ Mexico City bureau in 2001. He reopened the paper’s Bogota bureau in 2006. He has also covered the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. He is a graduate of the University of South Florida and also has been a reporter at the San Jose Mercury News, San Diego Union-Tribune and the San Diego Business Journal.

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