Innovation in Biotechnology: The Human Factor Işıl Güney, Ph.D. 9 th Swiss Turkish Economic Forum Istanbul, 10 December 2013
Innovation in Biotechnology: The Human Factor
Işıl Güney, Ph.D.
9th Swiss Turkish Economic Forum
Istanbul, 10 December 2013
Contents
I: Components of an Innovation Ecosystem
II: Turkey’s Innovation Targets & Human Capital
III: Human Capital: Singapore and Israel examples
IV: Summary for Turkey
Components of an Innovation EcosystemPart I
Innovation – The Basic Elements
Innovation
Government Policy Basic and translational research;
Development of human talent, entrepreneurship and competition; Immigration policy; Patent policy; Start-up support; Fund and follow-up projects with clear deliverables; Incentivize R&D investment; Stable
and consistent policies overall
Financial CapitalPublic funds; Philanthropic
funds; Angel funds; Venture capital
financing
Human CapitalQuality of education
and access to training resources; Intellectual fulfillment and financial incentives; Opportunity for career development
Technology & Knowhow
Internal build up and/or import from outside
Innovation Cities – General TraitsChatterji, Glaeser, KerrClusters of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, 2013Innovation Policy and Economy Forum
High Education of Workforce
Higher the education => higher the entry rate in innovation sectors (not the case for manufacturing sector)
Local human capital levels are important to the development and growth of areas
Rich Supply of Entrepreneurs
Entrepreneurs will migrate at the very high end of startups (e.g. Silicon Valley) but generally more inclined to establish their companies in their hometowns
=> policy efforts to promote entrepreneurship is important
Physical Infrastructure
Roads, airports, broad band internet access, etc
=> entrepreneurial cluster projects often launched with city revitalization projects
Innovation Cities – General Profile of Companies Chatterji, Glaeser, KerrClusters of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, 2013Innovation Policy and Economy Forum
Presence of Incumbent Firms
10% higher base of incumbent firms => 6% higher number of start-ups many entrepreneurs leave incumbent firms to start their companies start ups draw resources and knowledge from incumbent firms, with former
employees as conduit, all who are attracted to places that have been hospitable to the industry in the past
Optimal mix of large and small companies
At least one large innovative company (draws on past experiences of company and being less explorative in R&D efforts) & many small innovative firms, often founded by former employees of anchor tenants
Turkey’s Innovation Targets and Human CapitalPart II
Turkey – population 75 million
16th largest economy in the world
Production driven, low-medium tech
Objective: Transform into a knowledge-based economy for smart growth
2023 Targets
Become one of ten largest economies of the world
Become a leading country in R&D; raise R&D expenditure from 0.8% to 3% of GDP
Health declared priority area
Medicines export: 595m TL; import: 5b TL
Develop first Turkish drug by 2023
Government Incentives
From R&D infrastructure all the way to product marketing, attractive incentives from government agencies, including MoDev, MoSIT, MoEcon, TUBITAK, KOSGEB.
Turkey – R&D strategies
Research clusters, technoparks, consortia and centers under development
Teknopark Istanbul, Catalca Biovalley, Bio Istanbul, Inovita, Inoviz, ITAM, Bosphorus University Life Sciences Center, Dokuz Eylul University Cluster…
Government incentivizing local industry to do research
Call for biosimilars proposals
Government wants foreign pharma to do research in Turkey
Foreign pharma not encouraged by patent policy and reference pricing
Turkey – Human Capital
Brain Drain
Large number of successful Turkish PhDs opting to work abroad
Thousands of Turkish students leave Turkey to receive education; many do not return
TUBITAK providing grants to researchers who come back
Turkey – Number of Researchers
Who will advance science in Turkey?
Turkey – Building Human Talent
Target 2023, Supreme Council of Science and Technology
Increase number of FTE researchers from 64,341 in 2010 to 300,000
National Science & Technology Human Resources Strategy & Action Plan
(2011-2016)- Increase the number of personnel in Human Resources in Science and Technology
(HRST) and improving the distribution of HRST across sectors - Develop the research culture, the capabilities and experiences of researchers - Improve the work environment of the HRST- Increase the mobility of researchers- Develop the recruitment capacity of R&D personnel
Human Capital: Singapore and Israel ExamplesPart III
Singapore – population 5.4 million
Singapore previously had no biomedical research infrastructure or industry
Government decided in 1980s to develop country into a biomed innovation hub
Entire value chain, from basic research to clinical trials, product development, manufacturing and delivery
Coordinated establishment of major initiatives to jumpstart cluster
Major research centers, research funds, clustering, consortia, etc.
500m USD for development of Biopolis, a physical hub for life sciences
Designed to foster collaborations between nearby universities, institutes, science parks
Singapore Economic Development Board (EDB) attracted DFI from pharmaceutical multinationals
BMS cluster largely dominated by foreign companies; companies given generous incentives from EDB to conduct research and benefit from Singapore’s manufacturing capacity
Singapore – Human Capital
Lack of local talent => IMPORT INTERNATIONAL TALENT
An integral part of government’s strategy
Singapore Biomedical Research Initiative advised by preeminent foreign scientists
Sir Richard Sykes, Rector, Imperial College, London
Dr. John Mendelsohn, President, MD Anderson Cancer Center, USA
Prof. Peter Gruss, President, Max Planck Society, Germany, and others…
Other world renowned scientist recruited to leading research positions
Sidney Brenner, Alan Colman, Sir David Lane, Nancy Jemkins, Edison Liu, and others…
=> attract younger scientists from their network to work under them
Build internal talent in the meantime…
Government sends top students to leading universities for graduate education; students must return to Singapore. Target of 1000 trained PhDs by 2015
Initiatives for promoting international multidisciplinary research
Singapore-MIT alliance
Singapore – Results (in progress)
Now home to 6000+ highly qualified researchers from around the world
In 2010, 5000 R&D employees, 14,000 biomed manufacturing employees
Over $1.2billion spent on biomedical R&D annually
Over 50 biomedical sciences companies, 30 research institutes
In 2011, Singapore manufactured over $22billion of medicines and medical devices for global markets
Committed to investing $13billion between 2011-15 for research, innovation and enterprise
Push to develop life saving medications: a couple of drugs now in phase III
Israel – population 8 million
Israel made strategic decision to jumpstart science-based sector in 1960s Financial support to commercial R&D => reduce risk of market failure and of operating in geographically isolated location
Chief Scientist’s grants program (high-risk loan)Firms submit R&D proposals; govt grants cover 66-90% of costs on competitive basisChief Scientist’s office reviews proposals according to technical and commercial feasibility, risks and potential to generate expertiseSuccessful projects pay back to the Office of Chief Scientist the funding it received from small percentage of annual sales
Yozma – govt program to establish venture capitalEstablished 10 VC funds (40% of total capital investment)Rest contributed by foreign funds attracted by risk guarantees (tax incentives to foreign VC investment and funds doubled by government)=> Between 1991 and 2000, Israel VC increased nearly 60-fold from $58million to $3.3billion
High number of angels investors, low start-up costs
Israel – Human Capital
Compulsory military service
Early training in sophisticated technologies
Collapse of the Eastern Block in the 90s
Influx of nearly 1million highly trained ex-Soviet Jewish immigrants
Jewish diaspora around the world
Large pool of researchers providing assistance and know-how from abroad
Government set up technological incubator program in 1991 (leverage human talent)
Provide skilled immigrants with funding and knowhow to become entrepreneurs 40% of companies that came out of incubator are active to this day Private sector has invested $2.5billion on graduate companies
Israel – Results
From 1996 to 2012, number of life sciences companies increased from 186 to 1,100
Number one in the world in medical-device patents per capita
Largest number of companies listed on NASDAQ outside of US
Highest level of venture capital as share of GDP
High-tech industries make up nearly 50% of industrial exports
Take compounds through Phase 2, then partner with big companies
Israel continues to leverage outside expertise
Summary for TurkeyPart IV
Summary for Turkey
Turkey has set ambitious targets to become a knowledge based economy
Turkey is supporting the development of new research centers and clusters
In order for these initiatives to advance, Turkey must invest heavily in developing the necessary human talent
Turkey has a strong scientific diaspora it needs to attract back
At the same time, it must invest in drawing foreign talent and knowhow, via recruiting top international talent to Turkey as well as building international collaborations (e.g. Product Development Partnerships)
Finally, significant efforts must go into improving quality of education and access to training resources in Turkey in order to locally develop top talent
Priority must go into building talent as opposed to physical structures