Last month, a key state agency approved more than $10 million in public funds for San Diego’s biotechnology researchers. This is a key development for one of the most important economic engines in our region and can help San Diego continue to both save lives and strengthen its position as one of California’s most innovative and entrepreneurial industry clusters.
The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM), the state’s life sciences research agency, green-lighted grants on June 5th that will underwrite professional training and lab space at some of San Diego’s finest research institutions. The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, the University of California – San Diego, Scripps Research Institute, and the Burnham Institute for Medical Research will all be receiving sizable disbursements, laying the foundation for future lab work that may one day uncover cures for diseases that afflict millions of Americans, such as cancer, diabetes, and multiple sclerosis.
The CIRM grants are an important milestone for the region. Civic leaders still remember being barely edged out by San Francisco in the competition to host the CIRM headquarters in 2005. The 2005 decision was ironic given the strength and success of our region’s health science industry. To be sure, more than 70 biotech companies have spun off from laboratory work at the world-famous University of California – San Francisco, and the rest of Silicon Valley, a nine-county region, now harbors the biggest share of the nation's publicly traded biotechnology firms.
But in a county-by-county comparison, San Diego’s biotech sector is much larger than San Francisco’s or Santa Clara County’s. More than five hundred life science firms are in San Diego County and our region is ranked the densest industry cluster for research in the country. With a low-tax business environment and home to cutting-edge R&D, San Diego far outpaces any single municipality for corporate incentives to invest, but more work is needed by community leaders if we are to stay regionally competitive.
One area of particular interest is venture capital (VC), which has long been identified as a resource that San Diego cultivates well but could do more. A cursory comparison with the Bay Area bears that out. In 2006, more than $9.4 billion annually in total venture capital flowed to Northern California companies, dwarfing S.D.’s $1.2 billion in VC investments. To address that challenge, BIOCOM, San Diego’s local life sciences industry association, has taken pro-active steps to expand the VC community by leading an aggressive Capital Development campaign, and providing executive-style office space to non-local venture capital funds for their trips down south. CONNECT, a long standing leader in efforts to foster collaboration and entrepreneurism, is ramping up the capacity of key programs like the Springboard program and Venture Roundtable. The region should be proud of such efforts and take heart that in the first quarter of 2007, San Diego biotech companies secured 18 deals worth $360 million versus the 22 deals with Bay Area companies that totaled “only” $277 million.
Even more paving stones are being placed for future industry growth in San Diego. Earlier this week, the San Diego Institute for Policy Research helped launch the Partnership for the Global Economy, bringing together key community stakeholders to find ways to secure the region’s prosperity in a rapidly changing economy. Examining the needs of the local life sciences industry and other business sectors, Partnership participants will collaborate in the coming months, ultimately charting the course for the regulatory reforms and policy priorities necessary for San Diego’s business leaders to stay competitive on the world stage.
It is important that our local elected officials build upon these efforts. As we have written in this column before, housing costs remain a critical concern and have become a real impediment to the ability of leading life science companies to recruit and retain talented employees. And it is long past the time that ALL of San Diego leaders should stand shoulder to shoulder to support efforts by the Salk Institute to update its master plan so that it can continue to grow and prosper.
San Diego has incredible assets it can leverage to help the life sciences industry reach even greater success, but local government leaders must redouble their efforts if they want job growth and high-dollar investments to continue long-term. Stronger support from both the public and private sector will help launch our local researchers into the frontier of science for years to come, giving hope that one day we will find the cures we seek most.
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