Jed Doyle is an intrapreneur. And yes, that's spelled correctly. According to Doyle, an entrepreneur goes out with a burning passion and idea and tries to build it into a successful business. An intraprenuer, on the other hand, works with entrepreneurs, shaping the vision, guiding the team and making it happen.

Among ChromBA's products is the UniTip, a pipette composed of 4,000 separate microcapillaries. The UniTip is used for rapid concentration and purification of small volumes of biological samples, enabling the company to extract and separate DNA faster and easier than existing technologies.

This philosophy took hold at the very start of his career while he was still attending Penn State. Doyle worked for ASL, a small analytical chemistry company. He had the good fortune to work very closely with the founder, where his fresh perspective brought unexpected—and beneficial—insights into the business.

"I have a curious ignorance," he says. "I don't always know you can't do something, so I go in with fresh eyes. Sometimes it leads to new opportunities that wouldn't have otherwise been pursued."

You Can Go Home Again
Now after many years away, Doyle is "back home again" in State College as CEO of another startup company, ChromBA Inc. The company has a technology platform that can extract and separate DNA much faster and easier than current technologies. In addition to being up to 300 percent more efficient, the process requires fewer steps, reducing experimental error—key proof points for scientists who are inventing new drugs and diagnostic tests.

ChromBA technology can also be applied to things like proteins, peptides and chemical warfare agents. "For example, our technology can make it easier to see if our soldiers have been exposed to something," Doyle says. "Basically, my role is to be the intraprenuer to commercialize this technology."

A Friend in Pennsylvania
Ben Franklin Technology Partners has invested $120,000 and hundreds of person-hours in ChromBA to aid development and commercialization efforts.

"One of the best friends that startups have in Pennsylvania is the Ben Franklin Technology Partners," Doyle says. "Capital is very important, but Ben Franklin brings so much more than that. They're a great sounding board and provide a host of ongoing support and networking opportunities."

ChromBA is now five years old, and Doyle has been at the helm for six months. The National Institutes of Health is working with ChromBA's prototypes, and Doyle expects the company's first product to hit the market by the second quarter of next year. "We have established good proof of principal," he says. "Now we have to take it from prototype to product stage and get it to market."

The Road to State College
Doyle's road back to State College and ChromBA was paved with learning and success. He left ASL to join another analytical chemistry startup, Supelco. His initial responsibilities included formalizing their technical support. "It gave me a profound appreciation for customer need and was very formative to my management style," he says.

Five years into the role, he was asked to set up international distribution in Switzerland, gaining more valuable experience about the market, customers and his own leadership style. A few years later, he helped the founders prepare the company for the sale to Rohm & Haas (R&H), a Philadelphia-based Fortune 500 company.

"I am a lifelong learner, and R&H was big into training," he recalls. "They took us through an intense period of process improvement, which really fit my mentality." R&H held Supelco for six years before selling to Sigma/Aldrich. For the second time, Doyle was asked to help prepare the company for sale. When Sigma acquired Supelco, they asked Doyle to lead the transition as CEO, a role he held for three years.

Coming Full Circle
Doyle then took a position at Transgenomic, an early-stage company in Omaha, Nebraska that he helped grow to $38 million in revenues. "My primary role was to clean up manufacturing and develop applications, which is where the R&H experience was invaluable," he recalls. The result? Doyle helped transform the company into a leader in molecular-based genetics, and the company went through a $70 million IPO.

Doyle then set out to do some consulting, first in Oregon and then as president of a consulting group in Virginia. It was there that Allan Darr, a board member and early investor in ChromBA, reached out to Doyle and asked him to join the team as CEO. And so his career came full circle.

"I'm helping ChromBA to identify needs that exist in the various marketplaces that are either unmet or underserved," Doyle says. "In many ways, it has been a perfect journey back to State College."

 From the December 2006 issue