U.S. Bioscience's Perilous Path From Class Act To Class Action

Date: April 13, 1992 The orphan drug firm, Wall Street's darling in 1991, now faces fraud charges brought by some of its investors As 1991 came to a close, suburban Philadelphia-based U.S. Bioscience was riding high. In just 12 months the four-year- old biotechnology company had delivered its first anticancer product, Hexalen, to market. Corporate staff had doubled to 100 employees. The firm's much-publicized second product, Ethyol, was in accelerated review at the Food and Drug Administratio

Susan L-J Dickinson

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The orphan drug firm, Wall Street's darling in 1991, now faces fraud charges brought by some of its investors

As 1991 came to a close, suburban Philadelphia-based U.S. Bioscience was riding high. In just 12 months the four-year- old biotechnology company had delivered its first anticancer product, Hexalen, to market. Corporate staff had doubled to 100 employees. The firm's much-publicized second product, Ethyol, was in accelerated review at the Food and Drug Administration. And, most notably, U.S. Bioscience's stock had rocketed from $17 to as high as $87 per share on the American exchange.

It was a dream come true for company founder and chief executive officer Phillip S. Schein, as his firm made headlines in the business and scientific press.

But since the New Year, most of Schein's immediate high hopes for his company have come tumbling down. On January 31 FDA ruled to withhold approval of Ethyol, pending ...

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