BIOSCIENCE LEADERS TO RETIRE; ACCOMPLIMENTS, FUTURE CHALLENGES PROMPT COUPLE TO MOVE

BYLINE: By Tim Rausch Staff Writer

A husband-and-wife team who've had their hands on luring and growing bioscience companies for the past five years plan to retire in June.

A combination of age, professional accomplishment and now a battle with cancer are the reasons cited by Dr. Michael Gabridge, the associate vice president for technology transfer and economic development at the Medical College of Georgia. His wife, Lenie Roos-Gabridge, the executive director of the Georgia Medical Center Authority, plans to join her husband in retirement.

Dr. Gabridge said he was recently diagnosed with cancer. Tests are under way to determine its stage.

"In light of the fact that our organizations are in good shape, we have grandchildren we hardly see in Boston and Colorado, and now the cancer, it seemed an appropriate time to retire," Dr. Gabridge said.

In 2002, Mrs. Gabridge became the first full-time director of the Augusta-based group charged with promoting the biotech industry in Georgia.

Randy Hall, the chairman of the Georgia Medical Center Authority board, said Mrs. Gabridge made an "enormous" contribution to the life sciences industry.

"She came in during the early days and took that organization and turned it around, developed tremendous contacts in Atlanta, governor's office, Georgia Research Alliance, the General Assembly. Those contacts and her efforts have paid tremendous dividends for the authority," Mr. Hall said.

Dr. Gabridge runs the Life Science Bus-iness Development Center at MCG. He also files the institution's patents on intellectual property.

"Because of the mission of my organization, it is natural that we would be working closely with the Medical College of Georgia. It just turned out that our positions ended up where we had an opportunity to work together," Mrs. Gabridge noted.

Dr. Gabridge is 64. She is 62. The couple plans to relocate to Colorado, which was their home before coming to Augusta six years ago.

"We'll miss our friends in Augusta," Mrs. Gabridge said.

Mrs. Gabridge said she plans to stay in her position until a successor is named.

"We're going to miss her terribly, but we're certainly glad that she and Mike are moving forward," Mr. Hall said.

Mrs. Gabridge said the authority has a search committee already in place.

"We realized that we are now at a stage where we accomplished our goals and that it might be time to have new leadership take our organizations to the next stage," Dr. Gabridge said.

Frank Treiber, the vice president for research at MCG, said the incubator that Dr. Gabridge has been leading generated $3 million in economic growth since 2001.

"This whole process of trying to help in the formation and retention of life science companies in the Augusta area is working," Mr. Treiber said. "There's been a lot of growth in life science companies that if we didn't have Mike leading the way would not have occurred."

Dr. Gabridge noted that one of the companies in the MCG incubator will be "hatching" at the time of his departure. ClariPath Laboratories will be the first startup to do so.

Interestingly enough, he said, ClariPath will be moving into a bigger space in the Augusta BioBusiness Center on Broad Street, which is operated by Mrs. Gabridge's organization.

Reach Tim Rausch at (706) 823-3352or timothy.rausch@augustachronicle.com.