Photo: Les Todd

Take Timothy Jones, a venture capitalist who runs his own investment firm in Atlanta and could have easily captured the 2003 class award for best schmoozer, if there was such an award. A bicoastal kind of guy who first made his mark in IT and computer software in Silicon Valley, Jones is now seeking to pour capital into the next life-sciences stars because that's where "the smart money" from such computer industry gurus as Bill Gates, Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, and Oracle CEO Larry Ellison seems to be heading.

"For me, the biggest reason was to learn the 'space,' " says Jones, referring to the biotech field in business argot. "You could ask all the geeky questions you wanted." Believe it or not, he adds, he focused so much on learning that "in some ways, I felt I didn't do enough networking."

Then there are what Pirrung calls "the wild-card people," biotech believers who, even if they have no clue how the scientific knowledge might help them professionally, can't resist signing up for the program. They take the course purely out of their love of the science and their conviction that biotech will be the biggest thing since electricity, or at least the microwave oven. In 2002, he recalls, it was a husband-and-wife team of law professors from the University of Texas at Austin; a year or two earlier, it was the rich, private investor from Hawaii.

The latest prime example is Jess Wetsel, the head of a sizable, family-run landscape-architecture and maintenance firm in Dallas. Wetsel, who holds a bachelor's in philosophy and an M.B.A., notes that he "stayed a long way away from the science buildings on campus" while attending college and graduate school. Yet, even though he has no intention of switching careers, Wetsel enlisted in last year's course because he passionately believes that biotech developments will transform society over the next few decades.

"Biology trumps all," he says. "This is an area I believe will fundamentally change our world, like the microprocessor and the steam engine. It's just important and exciting and gee-whiz stuff."

Despite the course's grinding nature, participants usually rave about it to friends and recommend it highly to colleagues. Such high praise insures a steady stream of new midcareer professionals to the Duke campus every year. In fact, companies and organizations frequently send a second, third, or even fourth generation of staff members to the program. Lambert, who attended with three of his colleagues last May, says Amgen officials have been flocking to the program ever since the company's chief financial officer participated one year and came back rhapsodizing about it.

Even in last spring's shaky economy, the course attracted a near sellout crowd of thirty-eight participants. This year's program was filled by March 1, a month and a half before the deadline for applications. "I'm confident now that our program has legs," Pirrung says. "I think there's still a tremendous amount of people who need it."

Like several others interviewed, Melvin says he'd "gladly come back for Biotech for Business II. It wasn't for the faint of heart. But it was exactly what I was looking for."

--Breznick is a veteran business writer and editor based in Raleigh.