Pentex BioTech
ToC
Created by Narren Striker, PenTex was, at first, just your average biotech company – although more idealistic than most. Founded soon after Striker finished his studies, he and the first of the company’s employees began to work on various prototype pieces of biotech, one of which was a much improved and cheaper implant that detected heart problems.
But when there came the time to share this research with would-be investors, things quickly broke down. There were legal concerns, the investors said. Parts of the project and Striker’s ideas about how to move forward didn’t align with how things were done.
Most of all, it was about money. Sure, Narren’s ideas for cheaper products were good. But there had to be a good profit margin somewhere.
This enraged Narren, naturally. But he had little choice except to comply, at least for now – he needed the investors’ money for his company to survive. But he decided there and then that things wouldn’t always be this way.
In the couple of decades that followed, Narren became, at least outwardly, the perfect corporate CEO. PenTex flourished because of this, earning astronomical amounts of income. Using this money, Narren bought up other biotech companies, expanding his reach. Eventually, he bought up government officials, bribed them to look the other way.
In the end, PenTex developed a presence on almost all planets humans could be found. In the most underdeveloped ones, they only had a small enclave. In the advanced planets, a PenTex or subsidiary store could be found almost every square of city space. Moreover, PenTex also instituted a system of field medicine, whereby experienced doctors and engineers of the company accompanied expeditions – for a small fee.
With his newfound influence, Narren had enough control of the market to basically do whatever he wanted. First, he dropped the prices of all the products the company had already released out into the galaxy. This further boosted PenTex’s image, making them almost beloved by consumers.
But this wasn’t his main plan. Instead, he had had almost two decades to come up with something far bigger. Having spent many, many hours in his private, state-of-the-art laboratory – an entire private ship – he began to consider whether he could create the ultimate medicine, one that would help humanity against any and all diseases. It was, perhaps, a bit arrogant. But he’d managed so much in the past few years – why not this? And, after all, who would stop him? He had long since managed to get state investigators and investors off his back. He was the sole person in charge of his company, and oversight was a thing of the past.
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