Worldwide Biotech Competition Heats Up

A spate of traditionally non bio-centric regions announced biotech related economic development initiatives within the last week including Australia, Pakistan, Malaysia and Scotland.

–Australia's Geelong precinct within the state of Victoria has launched a new campaign to establish the region as a major research hub, which cited a report entitled Geelong Biotechnology Opportunities Study. The study names key attributes for an emerging biotech hub that are already in place in Geelong, such as research reputation, scientific infrastructure, and strong ties between acadamia and business. The precinct currently ranks seventh in biotech areas of Victoria with about 300 researchers.

–Pakistan's Higher Education Commision (HEC) Chairman addressed attendees of the country's first annual National Conference of Industrial and Environmental Biotechnology, and stressed the macroeconomic benefits of allocating funds towards biotech research at all levels.

–Malaysian Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi met with 20 senior executives of U.S. companies in New York last week to stress the need and opportunity for biotech investment to modernize the country's agriculture sector and ultimately improve its economy. He stressed that the country is on the rise and that recent investments have resulted in a 7.8 percent jump in economic activity in the first half of 2004. The two hour dialogue session was organized by JP Morgan and attended by executives of companies that have current investments in Malaysia such as Ford, IBM, Boeing, GE, Citicorp and Oracle.

–Lastly, Scotland's investment promotion agency Scottish Development International (SDI), has begun to foster relationships with French biotech companies to stimulate scientific collaboration in cancer research and boost the country's biotech industry. SDI will make a strong push through a series of similar trade missions such as a visit to BioJapan 2004, and two separate trips to the East and West coasts of the United States "to tap into the world’s largest healthcare market, forge collaborations and build future funding relationships with venture capitalists." All of the above are meant to build a “big and sustainable world-class” life sciences cluster to deliver future medical breakthroughs," in the country. Scotland has spent more than £10 million a year on the biotech sector for each of the last five years and £150m has been allocated to the country's Life Sciences Intermediary Technology Institute to help companies and academics commercialize research over the next 10 years.

All these developments point to the growing over-capacity to support what is currently a fledging industry. It suggests that areas worldwide should be working together to strengthen their competitive advantage. Go it alone strategies don't make sense for many areas--especially those with no defined strengths in the biotech sector.

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