Interviewee: David Goeddel. In 1980, Genentech became the first publicly traded biotech company. David Goeddel talks about his investment. (DNAi Location: Manipulation > Production > Players > David Goeddel > Shares and options)

When I joined Genentech my job offer had in it, I could purchase five hundred shares of stock at a dollar a share, I believe it was, and that would cost five hundred dollars. And I asked Swanson can I just join the company and get my salary, I don't want to pay for something, I need the money. And he said believe me, some day you'll be glad you bought this stock and we'll loan you the money, Genentech will loan you the money to purchase it. And I didn't think much more about the stock, then when we're starting to go public we had a few employee meetings and Bob Swanson explained to the employees what it meant, what we were going to do, we were going to raise money and then it would be a publicly traded stock. And rumors started coming around about what the price might be, and then scientists who could do, you know, multiplication on the number of the shares they had by the price, were thinking wow, this, this could be pretty exciting.

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