Documenti di Didattica
Documenti di Professioni
Documenti di Cultura
Introduction:
There are more than 4,000 specialized biotechnology companies worldwide. Themost wellknown companies are located in the USA and Europe, but there are significantcompanies
emerging in Canada, Australia,NewZealand and throughout Asia particularly inJapan.
Most of these companies are small with limited finances which made an impact on the
output of the industry in terms of new drugs.From the early 1980s to the late 1990s the
biotechnology industry was steadily increasing. However, year 2000 showed a decline in
new drug output. In fact, according to the CMR International Reportin 2002, only 28 new
molecular entities were launched globally, the lowest in over twenty years. The decline in new
drug output was perplexing during that period given that many companies in the industry have
been increasing their research and development expenditure on a regular basis over the
decade. Some industry observers believe that there was an innovation deficit brought about
by the many companies lack of new ideas and methodologies. Critics within thegeneral public
believe that the industry is producing too many new drugs that aresimilar to each other which
offer littleclinical advantage over those already onthe global market.To prevent further slippage,
the industry turned to biotechnology to provide a continuing innovation in R&D which hopes to
lead to a new generation of medical treatments.
During this period the global biomedical sciences industry is confronted with the need to
improveR&D productivity and bridge healthcare needs in fast-growing regions suchas Asia.
Global companies thenexplored Asias complexities and diversity to tap into the regions
markets.Singapore was seen as the ideal location to develop solutions that may deliver
significantimpact on theglobal healthcare because of its strong R&Dcapabilities, central location
and networks withregional markets.As a trusted location with a provenmanufacturing track
record for speed andquality, Singapore enables companies tomanufacture high quality drugs
and medicaldevices across various modalities.Currently, global companies and Asianenterprises
alike use Singapore as a base to driveexpansion in Asian and international markets.
This paper hopes to study the experiences, strategies and methods of one of the most
successful companiesin the Asian Region in thefield of biotechnology industry.
Overview of the Company and its Businesses
The Company
Advanced, Innovative, Trusted (AIT) Biotech Company started as a molecular service
company in 2008 offering sequencing technologies and DNA probe manufacturing. The
company was formed by two entrepreneurs:
Alex Thian an IP attorney with a specialization in international protection of
intellectual property rights, corporate structuring of technology investments and
commercialization and exploitation of inventions. He was also the external legal
advisor of National Science and Technology Board and Singapore productivity
and standards board from 1990 to 2000. In addition Mr. Thian is also the legal
advisor to the Institute of Materials Research and Engineering and the Science
and Technology Group of companies. He has an extensive experience in
incubating startups due to his experiences in forming Startups.com and 20 other
technology startups between 2000 and 2002.
Page 1 of 17
Page 2 of 17
Figure 1. The main services and products offered by AIT biotech (A) Sequencing of
DNA using the next generation sequencing platform (B) Developed diagnostic kits for
infectious diseases (C) Detection kits for detecting contaminants in the food industry.
Aside from providing molecular services and diagnostics the company also went into
being a supplier of laboratory consumables and equipment. Eppendorf AG which is a
known brand in the field of bioscience made AIT its official distributor in Singapore (AIT
Biotech, 2011). Other molecular biology products being distributed by AIT are enzymes
from New England Biolabs and Purification kits.
The fourth and the newest business of AIT is in the field of business ventures. The
company together with the Singaporean Government encourages commercialization of
technologies wherein AIT will give the necessary consultancy. In line with business
venturing, AIT has also become a technology incubator which currently houses three
startups:
Phoenix Molecular Pte. Ltd is a firm that develops and integrates three disruptive
technologies into a single system which by definition will change the market in
molecular testing by creating a simple, cost effective, fully integrated system that can
be utilized in military, industrial public health and human/veterinary diagnostics market.
Healthseq Asia Pte. Ltd is a company that is in the cloud computing field mainly on the
analysis of genomes. The technology that it is currently developing is said to be a
platform for the delivery of genome driven personalized medicines, analysis of clinical
trials and management of pharmaceutical clinical data.
Al Biomedical Pte Ltd on the other hand focuses on developing and providing Point of
Care and Direct to Consumer healthcare and diagnostics products.
Aside from providing molecular biology solutions and consultancy AIT biotech is
involved in developing the skill set of Singaporean researchers by offering training on
molecular biology.
Overview of the Country and Industry Context
Singapore
Singapore is a former British colony which gained its independence as the Republic of
Singapore in August 9, 1965 under the leadership of Lee Kuan Yew. The first years of the
country was characterized by instability due to several riots. Lee Kuan Yew was able to
overturn this instability by rapid economicgrowth, support for business entrepreneurship
and limited internal democracy making it a first world country.
The land area of Singapore presently is 719.1 km2 from an area of 581.5 km2 in 1960
(Statistics Singapore, 2014) though there are several reclamation projects still in the
Page 3 of 17
works the area of Singapore is still small. The country population is currently above 5
million from a previous population of 4 million in 2000.
In terms of education Singapore has focused on equipping its citizens with strong
mathematics and science background. Trends in International Mathematics and Science
study conducted by the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational
Achievement ranks Singapore in the top three every year since 1995 and Singapore
students also ranked in the world in terms of world in terms of mathematics, science,
and reading in the 2009 Programme for International Student Assessment, conducted by
the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
Tracing the strategy of Singapore
In the start of Singapore during the 1960s the country was labor intensive due to its
poorly educated workforce, labor conflicts, high unemployment and a rapidly growing
population (Poh, 2010)
The type of labor being employed was effective up to the mid-1970s when Singapore was
faced by competition coming from neighbor countries on low-tech industries and hightech manufacturing from developed countries. In order to be competitive Singapore
decided to slowly abandon its strategy into skill-intensive high-value added, technology
intensive industries such as electronics manufacturing and petrochemicals. One
approach to reach this target is to expand engineering education while providing funding
in order for older workers to retool themselves.
In 1985, Singapore faced its first major recession and since then the government
strategized into looking for new areas of economic growth. Singapore strategy is to
move beyond manufacturing into areas such as R&D and supply chain management. The
government also made efforts to encourage multinational companies to establish operational
headquarters in Singapore in order to support regional operations.
The problem of Singapore in the 1990s is to remain competitive against its competitors,
however the country has a small population with limited land area and limited resources.
Because of this the government concluded that part of their strategic move is to promote
strong intellectual capital that in turn would develop into knowledge intensive firms and
generate high value added jobs for Singaporeans.
The Biotechnology landscape of Singapore
In the late 1990s Singapore identified the field of biomedical science as an area into
which they could specialize on together with other fields such as chemistry, electronics
and engineering. This is the time when the whole genome sequencing project headed by
the United States is being conducted; Singapore cited this area as an area into wherein
there is tremendous growth potential. The field of biomedical science has been seen by
Singapore as a totally different field of specialization as compared to the other three key
fields. First is that biomedical science would require an entire value chain in Singapore
ranging from basic research to clinical trials, product/process development, full-scale
manufacturing and healthcare delivery (Okamoto, 2009). Another factor that was seen is
that unlike the electronics cluster that relies on a large anchor company with
surrounding supply chains the biomedical science relies in the laboratories of
Page 4 of 17
Page 5 of 17
GAP analysis of the demand and value of the product that the company
intends to offer.
Page 6 of 17
Resources and research that is needed to find new avenues for growth. With
this he cited the partnership with the government for startup funding and
hiring foreign consultants for expertise.
Structure and system which is what can be seen in AIT now as it transforms
into a more complex company from R&D up to a technology incubator.
Looking at these five ingredients; it can be deduced that AIT as a company is very open
to different methods in order to catch up in the field of biotechnology. It encourages
innovation via research and also placed strong emphasis on the contribution of the
people in the company and government support.
Technology Acquisition Methods Used by the Company
Internal R&D with networking
The R&D of AIT was internal, making use of the data that coming from existing journals and
conferences on molecular biology. Before conducting the internal R&D, AIT hired the people
who had the know-how on making diagnostic kits. It has also made networks with the academe.
Page 7 of 17
Page 8 of 17
Figure1:Singaporeseconomy(Source:
NRF)
By 2002, the National Science and Technology Board was renamed to its current name,
the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR). A*STAR is the largest
public R&D organization and is funded by the countrys Ministry of Trade and Industry. A*STAR
seeks to strengthen knowledge development in Singapore and to support innovation through
collaboration with industrial partners and create an economic impact that benefits the entire
nation. It is now one of the leaders of scientific research and consists of 14 research institutes
which focus on biomedical sciences and physical sciences & engineering.
With the biomedical sciences identified as a new growth area in Singapore, government
investments in research continued to rise; with S$6 billion budgeted for 2001 to 2005,
and a further S$13.9 billion in the 2006 to 2010 science and technology plan.
By 2010, public expenditure on research and development doubled, from 0.4% to 0.8% of
the GDP, while the number of research scientists in the public sector quadrupled, to
nearly 13,000. This steadily increasing national research budget reflects the importance
given by the Singaporean government to science, technology and research and echoes
its value to the nations growth and development.
Page 11 of 17
When the Biomedical Sciences Initiative was created in 2000, three phases of implementation
were identified.
Phase 1 (2000-2005): Building the Foundation- The first phase of development (2000-2005)
focused on establishing a firm foundation of basic biomedical research in Singapore by
developing core public research capabilities in the areas of bioprocessing, chemical synthesis,
genomics and proteomics, molecular and cell biology, bioengineering and nanotechnology, and
computational biology to support the BMS cluster, comprising the four key sectors:
pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, medical technology and healthcare services.
Phase 2 (2006-2010): Strengthening Translational and Clinical Research Capabilities- The
second phase of development (2006-2010) focuses on strengthening capabilities in translational
and clinical research, while continuing to build up basic research capabilities.
Phase 3 (2011-2015): Capturing Opportunities for Greater Economic and Health ImpactBuilding on this foundation created over the last 10 years, BMRC will support the next phase of
the BMS Initiative through focusing its efforts in 3 main areas to capture the growing
opportunities arising from global trends in the BMS industry.
1. Enhanced Industry Engagements for Greater Economic Outcomes
2. Focusing on Mission-Oriented Programs with high growth potential
3. Seamless integration and translation as key competitive advantages
Commercialization
The Singaporean Ministry of Trade and Industrys SPRING seeks to make Singaporean
companies more competitive by helping enterprises with financing, commercialization of
innovation and access to markets. Among the commercialization programs of SPRING are the
start-up financing program called Start-up Enterprise Development Scheme, and the R&D
funding program called the Technological Enterprise Commercialization Scheme.
Public-Private Partnerships
With strong government support, Singapore has established a strong track record and
foundation in biomedical sciences manufacturing and R&D activities. As such, Singapore
continuous to remain open to partnerships between the public sector R&D institutions with
leading pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. For Roche established its Singapore
Hub for Translational Medicine and Bayer Healthcare invested an additional S$14.5 million in
five projects with local academic institutions to advance R&D to improve early diagnosis and
treatment of cancer.
In recent years, other pharmaceutical companies have also partnered or collaborated with
A*STAR and other government institutions.
Maccine is collaborating with A*STARs Singapore Bio imaging Consortium to form a
comprehensive Translational Imaging Industrial Lab (TIIL) to push the boundaries in
state-of-the-art preclinical imaging to enhance the drug development process.
Siena Biotech is partnering A*STARs Experimental Therapeutics Centre to develop
molecular inhibitors of a major signaling pathway in oncology to target difficult-to-treat
forms of cancer such as gastric cancer, leukemia and brain tumors.
Page 12 of 17
Humalys SAS and Cytos Biotechnology are working with the Singapore Immunology
Network to develop antibody-based therapies for infectious diseases that are prevalent
in Asia.
Novartis (which houses more than 100 researchers from 18 nationalities at the Novartis
Institute for Tropical Diseases) teamed up with the A*STAR, and other institutions and
have discovered a new drug against malaria called spiroindolone NITD609.
GSK Biologicals and A*STARs Bioprocessing Technology Institute collaborated on the
S$2 million public-private partnership on vaccine and adjuvant system-related research
projects. In 2009.
Page 13 of 17
5.7 Analysis of the Critical Success Factors in the Companys Technology Acquisition,
Learning, and Catch-up
The story of Singaporean Small and MedieumEnterpirse (SME), AITbiotech, is another great
example of how public and private sectors can partner to drive impact in Singapore's healthcare
and biomedical industries.
The first successful collaboration of AITbiotech with the public sector was in 2010, when the
company acquired several moleculardiagnostic licenses from A*STAR for multiple pathogen
detection and surveillance assays including the H1N1, Dengue, Chikungunya and
Tuberculosis. These assays were developed at the A*STAR Institute of Molecular and Cell
Biology and the Experimental Therapeutics Centre.
According to A*STAR, AITbiotech was able to successfully commercialize the assays under its
abTES brand. AITbiotech now manufactures these assays in its ISO 13485 certified lab in
Singapore and are providing hospitals, labs and clinicians a time and cost saving tool to detect
as well as to differentiate the nature and type of influenza or dengue infection with enhanced
high sensitivity and precision. Proper diagnosis and treatment of patients directly benefit the
health care sector in Singapore and the region in the fight against infectious diseases. Further,
the assays have generated sales and are being used in hospitals in Thailand, Hong Kong,
Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore.
The second collaboration was in 2012, when A*STAR and AITbiotech jointly development of an
H5N1Avian Influenza real-time PCR assay. It is the most comprehensive and rapid H5N1 burd
flu test kit available to date. Within a few hours, the assay can rapidly detect all existing 52
genetic variants of the H5N1 Avian Influenza viruses and their respective sub-groups in a single
test with almost 100% accuracy. At the time, the standard of the World Health Organization
(WHO) for H5N1 detection was 3 out of the 10 distinct genetic variants per test and to detect all
existing strains with this method would require several days and rounds of testing.
These kits were developed by A*STAR and Biothech, but with financial support from SPRING
Singapores Technology Innovation Programme (TIP), and after its successful collaborations,
AITbotech partnership with SPING has evolved.
In 2013, SPRING Singapore set aside $10 million fund to help SMEs in the medical and clean
technology sectors develop and commercialize technology ideas into products and services. As
part of the initiative, SPRING appointed three private sector providers to act as translators
(PSTs),AITbiotech was one of the companies. As a PST, the company will identify, develop and
commercialize Intellectual Property (IP) for the medical technology industry. The PSTs will
identify suitable IP and help develop these into usable technology for their SME clients. Hence,
the PSTs will do the job of translating lab research into working prototypes which can be
commercialized into innovative products and services.
According to SPRING, such technology-based products will put SMEs in a stronger position to
compete in an increasingly competitive and crowded marketplace, where those with niche
capabilities will be faced with higher barriers to entry. Besides the translation of IP, the PSTs will
provide R&D services such as validation and feasibility studies. A total of 40 IP translation
projects and 200 R&D services will be undertaken by the PSTs over the next three years.
According to Alex Thian, the founder and CEO of AITbiotech, licensing these sophisticated
assays from A*STAR gave their company a springboard they needed to compete in the highly
Page 14 of 17
competitive market of Molecular Diagnostics. Thian also said that one for for SMEs to stay
competitive is by public private partnerships like the one it has with A*STAR.
AITbiotech has 40 employees working exclusively on product development and services in a
10,000 sqft state-of-art and ISO 13485 IVD-certified laboratory in Science Park I, which allows
them to conduct molecular diagnostic technology development and production as well as DNA
sequencing and production.
Comparison of the companys technological learning and capabilities with those of its
principal Philippine counterpart.
The medical technology sector in the Philippines is highly dependent on imports.
Foreign suppliers usually appoint a licensed distributor to sell their products in
Philippines. Usually, the distributors handle all aspects of importation from registration
of the products to obtaining a license and clearance. The local distributor not only helps
facilitate the products entry into the market, but also assumes responsibility for
advertising and promotion through sales and dealer networks.
It is the same in Singapore wherein foreign companies appoint a local distributor to
represent their companys products and services. The founder of AITbiotech, Mr. Alex
Thian, started first a distribution company in Singapore. This distribution company
brought in SARS diagnostics kits from Germany during the 2003 SARS crisis and
distributed them to hospitals. However, they sold the distribution company to a
multinational corporation realizing that the products were very expensive and decided to
use the knowledge he had obtained from distributing the products to start his own
company, AITbiotech, in 2008.
AITbiotech is not just a distributor of imported medical technology products but also a
molecular service company offering sequencing technologies and DNA probe
manufacturing. They have become a leading provider of genomic services and molecular
diagnostic kits to the research, healthcare and biomedical industries in Singapore and
Asia.
AITbiotech has also secured ISO 13485:2003 certification, for design, development and
manufacturing of IVD medical devices for detection of infectious diseases; and
manufacturing of oligonucleotides and sequencing services. With the certification
AITbiotech will be able to obtain CE certification for its molecular diagnostics assays.
The company was the first genomic services provider in Asia to secure 13845:2003
certification for its genomic services.
,
AITbiotech continues to transforms into a more complex company from R&D up to a
technology incubator. The company initiates and sets up a new division, AITventures, to
commercialize life science and diagnostic technologies in Singapore. Building on in-house
capabilities and global network of consultants AITventures will be able to provide
commercialization services to public institutions as well as start-ups in the areas of
diagnostic technologies commercialization including prototyping, clinical trials, product
and process development, manufacturing and regulatory compliance.
Important learnings and lessons for Philippine companies
Page 15 of 17
Page 16 of 17
products and services. They also reduced their dependence on imported medical
technology and they were able to manufacture their own products.
References
AIT Biotech Press Release July 6, 2011 (http://www.aitbiotech.com/wpcontent/uploads/AITbiotech-Eppendorf-Press-Release-26th-July-2011.pdf)
Statistics Singapore Latest Data Population & Land Area (Mid-Year Estimates)".
Statistics Singapore. June 2014. Retrieved 25 September 2014.
Poh, LC. 2010. Innovation Policy around the World: Singapore: Betting on Biomedical
Sciences. Issues in Science and Technology. Vol 26 Issue 3
Okamoto, Y. 2009. Creating a Biotechnology Cluster: Lessons to learn from Singapores
Experience.Doshisha University Policy Studies (3).198-217.
A*STAR.Mind to Market, an ETPL RIE 2015 Midterm Report. June 2015.
Van der Drift, S. 2014. Netherlands Enterprise Agency.Innovation Landscape in
Singapore.
Page 17 of 17