Is the European Union ready for the biotechnology challenge? A round table in Portoroz, Slovenia
Date: 31.5.2006
Portoroz, Slovenia, May the 29th. In 1990, Europe was stronger in biotechology R&D than the USA, but today it is lagging behind. Since biotechnology is going to be one of the key industries of the 21th century, Europe should move quickly, as newcommers like India are moving in. This is the message of the round table on the future of biotechnology in the European Union that took place in connection with the Monolith Summer School 2006, a gathering of the top scientists in the field of “monoliths”-a biopharmaceutical production technology.
Dr. Fintan Walton, CEO of PharmaVentures Ltd. from Oxford Science Park, said that there are 94.000 biotechnology jobs in Europe and 170.000 in the USA, and that the USA invests twice as much money in this industry than Europe. Obviously America has a much better system of financing technological entrepreneurship; additionaly the goverment supports biotechnology companies with 2.5 billion dollars of grants every year. All this is the consequence of years of fine-tuning the system that now is bearing fruit. Dr. Franz Krejs of the Horizonte Venture Capital Fund from Vienna said that venture capital funds can grow only in countries which acknowledge the importance of this form of financing, and introduce appropriate changes in its tax system. “In the 50’s and 60’s the American government added 4 dollars for every one invested into a small company. America wouldn’t be where it is without this policy,” said dr. Krejs.
But Europe is mustering more and more capital to support the growth of new companies. The Austrian Green Hills Biotechnology company has for example so far received 7 million euros in seed capital and 13 million in grants from European and Austrian state grants.
But why aren’t there more such case?. The answer is: Europe is slow in reacting to entrepreneurial opportunities. Dr. Miomir Knezevic, who has founded several biotech companies in Europe, said that researchers have very good ideas but these ideas are not turned into products for the market, so that the best brains move to the USA and start their companies there. Or move their European companies to the USA once they get fed up with the “European environment”, adds dr. Fintan Walton.
Should Europe become a copy of America? Dr. M.A. Vijayalakshmi from India, who has worked in France for the past 35 years, says “no”. She does not like the “Americanisation of India”, and would like to see Europe invent new institutions more in line with its traditional values which are less agressive than American, and respect nature much more.
There are indeed many new and good ideas in Europe, but we are slow in implementing them. When new measures have to be adopted, one country can veto the proposal, and stop the European machinery, said dr. Torbjoern Ingemansson from DG Reasearch in Brussels. And a minor change in the laws regarding intelectual property can take ten years, says dr. Hans-Wilhelm Meyers from the Kreisler Selting Werner patent office from Germnay.
The resistance to change and slow reaction time seems to be the central problem of Europe – a pity, since Europe is a very creative continent. Dr. John Villadsen from Denmark explains that a number of American companies depend on Danish inventions, which are the fruit of the genuine Danish social model in which people from the universities and companies network intensely. Europe could definitively show more to the world.
140 participansts of the Monolith Summer School 2006 which is organized by the Slovene biotech company BIA Separations will exchange their latest ideas until Wednesday.
"Source":[ http://www.monolith-events.com/press.asp]
