Ground-breaking Ceremonies for the "University/industry cooperative R& D Building" of the Chu-Bei Branch School and the "Pharmaceutical Science and Technology Building" at the College of Public Health campus were held on the same day

To meet the fervent expectations from the general public, NTU held the ground-breaking ceremony for the "university/industry cooperative R&D building"of the Chu-Bei branch school on May 13th. The establishment of the Chu-Bei branch school was primarily for the purpose of integrating university and local resources to play the advantages of academia/industry cooperation to the full, while promoting further development of the Hsin-chu area, and solving the educational inadequacies of the locale.

In 2000 the Ministry of Education permitted the Hsin-chu County government to appropriate public land for the construction of the NTU Chu-Bei branch school (on a later on pay-back basis). The Executive Yuan further issued an official statement on May 3rd, 2000, stipulating that "the necessary funds for the construction of the branch school in the initial stage are to be garnered by the University on its own, and the follow up funds should in principle be self financed." After securing the funding sources, NTU made several revisions and amendments to the overall planning report , which was approved by a Special Project Review Committee of the Ministry of Education in January, 2007. In order to implement this project, NTU approached its powerful and affluent alumni in the business world to form a "planning committee for the construction of the Chu-Bei Branch School" in an effort to solicit the necessary funds through university/industry cooperation.

The first session for the "university/industry cooperation project" was held in August 2007. Etron Technology and Health Banks respectively signed agreements for university/industry strategic alliance with NTU shortly afterwards. Dr. Nicky Lu, Chairman of Etron Technology, donated stocks under his own name. In addition, Dr. Jane H. Hsiao, an alumnus from NTU's Department of Pharmacology, agreed to appropriate funds from her original donation to NTU for the construction of the two new buildings.

Dr. Jane H. Hsiao's generosity was echoed by Dr. Samuel Yen-Liang Yin, CEO of the Ruentex Group, who promised to let Ruentex Engineering and Construction Company take up the construction work, and absorb the fees for architectural design on his own. Owing to the timely assistance from Dr. Samuel Yin, and the guidance from Mr. Yung-chin Cheng, magistrate of the Hsin-chu County and his staff, the construction project for the Chu-Bei branch school of NTU was able to progress smoothly and speedily, and the completion of the hardware part of the "university/industry cooperative R&D building" is scheduled for December of this year, whereupon the license of the building will be issued.

The "university/industry cooperative R & D building" is the first building to be constructed for the Chu-Bei branch school. In the initial stage units which will move into the building shall include the College of Medicine, the College of Engineering, the College of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, the College of Life Sciences, the Interdisciplinary Research Center, and the University/Industry Cooperative Lab. With the completion of this new building, the gap between the Chu-Bei branch school and the Taipei main campus will be narrowed, and new initiatives will be opened up through benign and frequent interaction.

On the same day, NTU also held the ground-breaking ceremony for the "pharmaceutical science and technology building" at the College of Public Health campus. About 100 VIPs attended these ceremonies, including President of NTU Dr. Si-chen Lee, outstanding alumnus Dr. Jane H. Hsiao, Dean of College of Medicine Dr. Pang-Chyr Yang, Chairman of Yung-Kang Foundation for Pharmacy Promotion Mr. Yung-shung Chen, Director of NTU Center for Drug Research Dr. Shoei-sheng Lee, and CEO of the Ruentex Group Dr. Samuel Yen-Liang Ying.

The purpose of the "pharmaceutical science and technology building" is to promote the multi-faceted development of pharmaceutical science and technology and to strengthen the development of industrial pharmacology and clinical pharmacology. Its goals include

1. To raise the standards of pharmaceutical education in Taiwan, and use pharmaceutical education as the rightful means to cultivate qualified pharmacists.
2. To raise the standards of pharmaceutical technology research in Taiwan, and to assist the government in developing pharmaceutical science and technology, while becoming an important training center for specialized pharmacists.
3. To assist the government in the development of pharmaceutical industry, and, by working with NTU's Drug Research Center, integrate talents with different specializations to promote research, so that Taiwan's pharmaceutical technology can be upgraded to international standards at an early date.

The construction of the "pharmaceutical science and technology building" stems originally from the goodwill of Dr. Jane H. Hsiao, who graduated from the Department of Pharmacology years ago. She not only donated large amounts of funds, but was actively involved in the planning from beginning to end. This new building is situated at the old site of the basketball field and the 16th boy's dormitory behind the dismantled Public Health Building. The surface area of the base is around 850 pings, while the five story building and the basement have around 2700 pings of usable space.

On top of all these, NTU wants to express its gratitude to Dr. Samuel Yen-Liang Yin, CEO of the Ruentex Group, who not only promised to undertake the construction work free of charge, but also donated the deficient funds. Mr. Hsing-Hwa Lo, chief architect of the Asia Design Group, also generously agreed to complete the design for the new pharmaceutical building free of charge. With the full devotion of these two benefactors, the construction work moved along smoothly, and by the end of this year the outer appearance of the new building shall be finished. Funds permitting, interior decoration can be done by the end of next year.