ARCH wants to invest locally

ARCH Venture Partners, a venture capital firm specializing in seed and early stage investment, is interested in investing US$20 million to set up an immune regulation and anti-cancer research center in Taiwan, according to an ARCH scientific advisor. Professor Shutsung Liao (廖述宗), who is concurrently a researcher of the Cancer Research Center of the University of Chicago and a member of Academia Sinica, Taiwan's highest research institute, said ARCH is a spin-off from an innovative technology commercialization initiative originated by the University of Chicago. Half of the US$30 million venture capital fund raised at the initial stage in the late 1980s came from Taiwan, he disclosed.