New Report Identifies States' Investments for Biosciences

States and regions across the U.S. are continuing to make significant investments and implement policies to capitalize on the growing biosciences sector. However, a challenge they face in coming years is a leveling off of federal bioscience R&D dollars, concludes a recent report prepared by Battelle, SSTI and PMP Consulting.

The report, Growing the Nation's Bioscience Sector: State Bioscience Initiatives in 2006, is a follow-up to the 2004 report Laboratories of Innovation: State Bioscience Initiatives 2004, prepared for the Biotechnology Industry Organization (see the June 7, 2004 issue of the Digest). The authors developed data to measure the size, composition and geographic distribution of the biosciences across the country. Since that report, new bioscience discoveries have continued to fuel the growth of the bioscience sector, and states and regions have responded with an increased commitment to building an infrastructure that encourages innovation and applications of bioscience research discoveries in multiple industries, the report states.

In an effort to understand how and where the bioscience sector is growing and how public policy is supporting this growth, the 2006 report presents updated data, examines trends, and identifies metropolitan areas with the largest and most concentrated employment in each of the biosciences subsectors. These include agricultural feedstock and chemicals; drugs and pharmaceuticals; medical devices and equipment; and research, testing and medical laboratories.

As a growing and vibrant sector of the U.S. economy, the biosciences industry employs 1.2 million people across the U.S. and Puerto Rico, the report finds. Two-thirds of this employment is found in the medical devices and equipment and the research, testing and medical laboratories subsectors. Comparatively, employment in the biosciences increased just over 1 percent since 2001, while total U.S. employment declined by 0.7 percent during the same period. Some key employment findings include:

• The nation's 1.2 million bioscience jobs generated an additional 5.8 million jobs in the economy, resulting in total employment impact of 7 million jobs.
• The average annual wage of bioscience workers in the U.S. was $65,775 in 2004 - more than $26,000 greater than the average private sector wage.
• Sizeable bioscience employment is found in a little less than half of the states. Nineteen states and Puerto Rico have a sizeable employment base in at least one of the biosciences subsectors, and 11 states and Puerto Rico have large employment bases and are specialized in at least one of the industry subsectors.

Additionally, the report identifies current key trends in state and regional initiatives to support the biosciences. Not all states have the same bioscience assets, and it is only by focusing on each state's or region's strengths that they will succeed in capturing the economic benefits of bioscience discoveries, the report states. The second section of the report identifies state initiatives, including examples of specific programs and policies. Some key findings include:

• Smaller states that have not traditionally invested in their bioscience base are beginning to do so.
• States and regions are focusing activities on developing their agricultural, industrial and environmental bioscience sectors in addition to their biomedical and health sectors.
• States and regions are focusing on how to leverage their growing bases of academic and medical research facilities to create physical environments that can be supportive of and a magnet for bioscience companies.
• States and regions continue to struggle to obtain sufficient risk capital, and they are experimenting with ways to encourage angel investors and locally developed seed funds to fill this critical funding gap.
• Stem cell research as a topic and focus of discussion has swept the nation; just four states, however, have committed funds to stem cell research, including California, Connecticut, Illinois  and New Jersey.
• Industry, educators and public officials seem to have a renewed interest in building a better pipeline of students interested in science, technology and mathematics in the K-12 system.
• Metropolitan statistical areas (MSA) of all sizes are heavily engaged in bioscience activities. Of the 361 MSAs examined, 193 have a specialization in at least one of the four bioscience subsectors.

The authors foresee in the near future a challenge in responding to the national mandate to advance translational research, as few states have developed strategies to link basic and clinical research. Also, competition for funding is likely to increase, making state investments more important.

Growing the Nation's Bioscience Sector: State Bioscience Initiatives in 2006 is available at: http://www.bio.org/local/battelle2006/

Links to this paper and nearly 4,000 additional TBED-related research reports, strategic plans and other papers can be found at the Tech-based Economic Development (TBED) Resource Center, jointly developed by the Technology Administration and SSTI, at http://www.tbedresourcecenter.org/.