A biotechnology contract research company is trying to propagate new business for itself by funding a biotechnology venture capital group in the hope that emergent firms will require contract research. At the start of October, Quintiles Transnational (Research Triangle Park, NC), which conducts contract research for small and large biotechnology firms, placed an undisclosed amount of money into a $16 million pot managed by the North Carolina Biotechnology Center (Research Triangle Park, NC), a state-sponsored initiative to develop biotechnology. As well as Quintiles, NationsBank (Tampa, FL), Wachovia Bank (Atlanta, GA), and the Wellcome Trust (London) contributed to the center. Pat Grebe, a Quintiles spokesperson, is quick to note, "We are not the largest investor here." The center, which has created around 90 bioscience firms in North Carolina over the last 10 years, will use the money to fund entrepreneurial bioscience companies. According to Grebe, investment in the fund is supposed to be money-making through investing in early stage firms and selling developed technology later. But, if extra contract research business is generated as a result of new biotechnology firms, all the better. However she adds, "There is no obligation on either side to have to work with each other."