From Surgeon to Billionaire CEO: Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong’s NantHealth Submits IPO Filing
On the 2015 Forbes list of the wealthiest Chinese individuals, Patrick Soon-Shiong ranked 15th with a net worth of $12.2 billion, earning him the title from Forbes as the wealthiest doctor in history. In 2016, he was named by the Los Angeles Times as one of the highest-paid CEOs of 2015. This month, NantHealth, the digital health subsidiary of Dr. Soon-Shiong’s NantWorks group, filed for an initial public offering (IPO).
On his Twitter homepage in the United States, Patrick Soon-Shiong has defined himself with three titles: Chairman, CEO, and Founder. He is the Chairman of the Patrick Soon-Shiong Family Foundation and the Advanced Health Institute, CEO of NantKwest and NantWorks, and Founder of NantHealth.
From a South African Boy to an American Surgeon
Patrick Soon-Shiong, a Chinese-American, was born in South Africa in 1952. In the United States, he is known as Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong Chan. His father was a rural physician in Fujian Province in southern China. The Chen family had nine sons and one daughter, with Patrick Soon-Shiong being the sixth son. During World War II, the entire family relocated to South Africa to escape the ravages of war. After graduating from high school, Soon-Shiong attended medical school in Johannesburg on a scholarship, where he earned his Doctor of Medicine degree. His first patient was a white South African who initially refused to let him touch his body. However, after Soon-Shiong successfully cured the patient’s sinus infection, the patient told everyone he met, “See that Chinese doctor; make sure he treats you.”
After moving to the United States, he began his surgical training at the University of California and the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), becoming a board-certified surgeon.
While serving as a surgeon at UCLA, Patrick Soon-Shiong garnered significant attention for performing pancreatic islet cell transplantation on a diabetic patient. The president of the American Diabetes Association dismissed it as an “inappropriate gimmick,” stating that it was premature to consider it a cure and that it could not even be regarded as a treatment. In 1990, Soon-Shiong left the University of California, Los Angeles, to establish his first company, VivoRx, which specialized in the research and development of diabetes medications. At the time, both the major pharmaceutical company Mylan and Soon-Shiong’s elder brother showed strong interest in his pancreatic islet cell transplantation technology, jointly providing $5 million in investment to VivoRx.
But soon, Patrick Soon-Shiong’s interests shifted to cancer research. He founded Abraxis BioScience to develop nanoparticle formulations of the anticancer drug paclitaxel, sowing the seeds of conflict with his investors. His elder brother and MacLean Associates dismissed him twice and filed a lawsuit against him, alleging that he had illegally transferred research funds from VivoRx to Abraxis BioScience. Soon-Shiong denied these allegations and even refuted the claim that his elder brother had ever invested in him. Ultimately, Patrick Soon-Shiong and his elder brother parted ways.
Development of the New Anti-Cancer Drug Abraxane
In 1997, Patrick Soon-Shiong founded American Pharmaceutical Partners (hereinafter referred to as “APP”). Eager to achieve a breakthrough in oncology drugs, he spent ten years developing Abraxane, which ultimately proved successful. This medication demonstrated greater efficacy and fewer side effects than paclitaxel, the best-selling cancer drug worldwide at the time.
In December 2001, APP successfully went public, raising $144 million.
In September 2003, the company stated in a press release that Phase III clinical trials demonstrated Abraxane’s superiority over paclitaxel. However, due to the lack of supporting detailed data, Wall Street slashed APP’s stock price by one-third, reducing the company’s market valuation from $3 billion to $2 billion. Patrick Soon-Shiong announced that he would provide details at an upcoming scientific conference, but researchers remained frustrated by the omission of specific data. Dissatisfied shareholders quickly filed a lawsuit against APP, alleging the dissemination of misleading information. It was later revealed that Soon-Shiong had sold his 300,000 shares before the stock price declined. Finally, in December 2003, APP obtained supportive data from clinical trials, confirming that Abraxane was significantly more effective than paclitaxel in the treatment of breast cancer. In 2005, Soon-Shiong achieved a major victory as Abraxane received approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), causing APP’s stock price to surge by 47%.
Patrick Soon-Shiong successfully developed the novel anticancer drug Abraxane and went on to found three biopharmaceutical companies. Before the onset of the financial crisis, he decisively sold his stake in APP Pharmaceutical to the German pharmaceutical giant Fresenius for $4.6 billion. This June, he further divested his 82.4% ownership in Abraxis BioScience for $2.9 billion. These two transactions significantly boosted Patrick Soon-Shiong’s net worth.
Doctors, Scientists, Businessmen
“Bob Pierce, Senior Vice President for Government Relations at Aboris Biotech, stated in an interview with The Bund Pictorial: ‘He is proficient in both internal medicine and surgery, serving as a physician, a scientist, and a successful businessman. It is rare for physicians specializing in internal medicine to also excel in surgical procedures, and equally rare for scientists to possess business acumen. He represents a perfect integration of all these professional identities.’”
In 2007, Patrick Soon-Shiong founded NantHealth, providing a cloud-based infrastructure for healthcare information sharing. Established in September 2011, NantWorks aims to converge ultra-low-power semiconductor technology, supercomputing, high-performance secure advanced networking, and augmented intelligence to transform the way we work, play, and live.
In October 2012, Patrick Soon-Shiong announced that NantHealth’s supercomputing system and network could analyze genomic data from cancer samples in just 47 seconds, with data conversion taking 18 seconds.
In January 2013, Patrick Soon-Shiong founded another biotechnology company, NantOmics, dedicated to the development of anticancer drugs. Both NantOmics and its sister company, NantHealth, are subsidiaries under the umbrella of NantWorks. NantWorks aims to treat and control cancer by integrating diagnostics, high-performance computing technologies, establishing data-sharing network models for tumor genomics, and promoting personalized medicine. The companies under Patrick Soon-Shiong’s leadership employ approximately 800 people across offices in 14 cities. The holding parent company, NantWorks, is divided into nine independent units, each with distinct investor groups and structured to allow for independent trading.
In July 2015, Patrick Soon-Shiong filed an IPO application for the biotechnology company NantKwest, which was valued at $2.06 billion, setting a new historical high for biotech company valuations.
In April 2016, the Los Angeles Times reported that Patrick Soon-Shiong received $148 million in compensation from NantKwest, making him one of the highest-paid CEOs.
Patrick Soon-Shiong has also been building his own biomedical empire through continuous acquisitions. He acquired Eviti, a Philadelphia-based company that functions as an insurer covering costs associated with medication errors. He also purchased iSirona, a Florida-based firm specializing in connecting hospital equipment with electronic health record (EHR) systems. Furthermore, Dr. Soon-Shiong acquired several other technologies: Qi Imaging, a tool that enables physicians to view CT and MRI scans on mobile devices; GlowCap, a company that developed smart pill bottles priced at $80, which monitor patient medication adherence and send notifications to doctors when the bottle is opened; and National LambdaRail, the U.S. government’s high-speed computer network, for $100 million, thereby breaking down barriers to data transmission.
The Philanthropy of Billionaire Patrick Soon-Shiong
In 2009, Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong and his wife established their family foundation. In a letter responding to the donation, the couple wrote, “Through our family foundation, we will gradually improve and ultimately eliminate inequities in the healthcare system, building a new model that prioritizes keeping people healthy and ensures that everyone receives the best possible medical care when needed. My children and I are committed to dedicating our time and resources to achieving this goal.” The Soon-Shiong Family Foundation has donated a total of $135 million to St. John’s Hospital in Los Angeles.
In early August 2010, Patrick Soon-Shiong became known worldwide as the first Chinese-American billionaire to sign the Gates-Buffett "Giving Pledge."
2020 Cancer Moonshot
In January 2016, U.S. President Barack Obama announced the establishment of the Cancer Moonshot Task Force, led by Vice President Joe Biden. This initiative aimed to unite academia and industry by removing certain bureaucratic obstacles to shorten the timeline for cancer cure research and accelerate progress in cancer prevention, treatment, and cures.
In April 2016, Patrick Soon-Shiong mentioned his involvement in the Cancer Moonshot Initiative during a conversation with Eric Topol, Editor-in-Chief of Medscape. He stated, “In late 2014, U.S. Vice President Biden called me regarding his son’s brain cancer, and I participated in the diagnostic process. Unfortunately, his son passed away in May. In October, I authored a white paper discussing the use of genomic sequencing and big data to accelerate cancer immunotherapy. This white paper became the mission statement of the ‘Moonshot Initiative,’ emphasizing the necessity of immunotherapy and whole-genome sequencing.”
Regarding Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong’s role in the Cancer Moonshot initiative, he stated, “Last November, Vice President Biden came to Los Angeles to visit me and spent four hours talking with me at a 15-acre campus housing the healthcare division of Bell Labs. Leveraging National LambdaRail, which we had previously acquired, we collected vast amounts of patient data to capture real-time monitoring results of patients’ vital signs. There, the Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) serves as both a tool and an objective: enabling real-time patient monitoring, establishing mission-control centers, providing next-generation molecular diagnostics, administering novel epitope-targeted antibodies, and developing vaccine-based immunotherapies—all of which have profoundly transformed traditional cancer treatment paradigms.”
Currently, Patrick Soon-Shiong’s Twitter cover image is the promotional graphic for the 2020 Cancer Moonshot Initiative. Reflecting on his transition from an academic to a biotechnology entrepreneur, Dr. Soon-Shiong described it as an extension of his scientific career, specifically the translational application of basic science. He has consistently pursued the development of medical devices and novel therapies that benefit patients. Now, three decades later, this original aspiration remains unchanged.