Ireland has been at the top of its game in the life sciences sector for a number of years. The question is, how long will that continue?
Right now the vital signs look good. According to Enterprise Ireland, the State’s business development agency, the life sciences sector – which includes medical devices, pharmaceuticals and biotechnology – exports more than € 45 billion annually and employs over 50,000 people directly.
Ireland is the number one European location for international pharmaceutical investment, and is home to more than 30 FDA (Food and Drugs Administration, the US regulatory authority) approved pharma and biopharma plants.
As a result, six out of 10 of the world’s top-selling drugs are produced in Ireland and 18 of the world’s top 20 pharmaceutical companies have substantial manufacturing operations here.
Four decades of continuous investment has made Ireland the location of choice for international life sciences companies.
“The work of organisations such as the IDA has been crucial in creating a setting where investment and development can flourish,” says Mairead Dunne, site director at pharmaceutical company AbbVie in Cork. Ireland also has a thriving research environment and this has been greatly assisted by increased capital investment and support from development agencies.”
AbbVie has recently collaborated with Science Foundation Ireland to invest €10 million in a number of collaborative research opportunities with academic groups with the aim of identifying novel treatment pathways for a number of diseases within its own areas of research.
Science Foundation Ireland (SFI), the national foundation for investment in scientific and engineering research, plays a pivotal role, including funding strategic research centres across the country.
And where ground breaking research happens, investment follows. Last year saw the launch of a €85 million life sciences venture capital fund, from Fountain Healthcare Partners as well as the flotation of Malin Corporation, the Irish based global life sciences company that raised €330 million to invest in life sciences businesses.
Moreover, investment of €154 million by Science Foundation Ireland helped Irish researchers secure a further €130 million in competitive non-exchequer funding, including €79 million from the EU’s Horizon 2020 as well as €38 million in industry co-funding for research projects.
All this helped nudge Ireland up the international rankings for the quality of its scientific research, from 16th to 14th.
“Irish science is delivering,” says Mark Ferguson, director general of SFI. “We have excellent science, good engagement with industry and the capacity to do more.”
There is, however, “no room for complacency”, he cautions.
“Challenges, which are also opportunities, exist. Life sciences research, for example, is increasingly being outsourced by major companies. That’s a big opportunity for us, and one that we have been doing well at competing for, but we are up against emerging groups from China and India, as well established operators in the US and UK. So we need to be at the cutting edge, with star people in this sector performing at a high level.”
One of the biggest developments in life sciences sector globally relates to manufacturing. “It is likely to be disrupted in a major way,” says Ferguson.
“We’re facing a scenario where, for example, instead of manufacturing a range of replacement hips, surgeons will instead – using X-ray and 3D printing technology – create a customised implant for their patient. That brings challenges in terms of manufacturing, as well as a real opportunity for Ireland, which has all these pharma and med-tech companies already here, to be at the very front of the next wave of life sciences manufacturing.”
The presence here of Internet of Things and Big Data companies too means Ireland is well placed in relation to the likely convergence of all these technologies.
“We have the outstanding research centres, the academic expertise and the companies to create the new processes of the future. The world is a changing place and Ireland has done well, but we must have an eye to the future too, both at the discovery end of things and at the nuts and bolts manufacturing end,” says Ferguson.
Over the longer term, the increased longevity and the ageing populations of many parts of the world, from Europe to Japan, presents opportunities for the sector.
“Obviously people will need more medications and more health care, but paying for that will be the challenge,” says Sean O’Keeffe of accountancy firm KPMG Ireland’s life sciences group.
“For the pharma companies, the cost of research and reimbursement for what they do will be a huge issue, particularly as governments like to reduce reimbursement rates for drugs.”
In the meantime, a challenge is coming from the other end of the age spectrum too – the risk that Ireland won’t have enough of the highly skilled graduates the sector will need. “For the sector to be sustainable, Ireland needs to invest in our universities and at higher level in science and technology. Two-thirds of the people working in these companies are graduates. It is an area of complex manufacturing, so we need to be investing much more on that front,” says O’Keeffe.
It’s not just Ireland that recognises this. “The challenge globally is that the way we produce or manufacture pharmaceuticals hasn’t changed in 50 years,” says Jon O’Halloran, general manager of the Synthesis and Solid State Pharmaceutical Centre (SSPC). Located at the University of Limerick, it is one of SFI’s 12 funded centres of research.
“We’re still making tablets like we did 50 years ago, at a time when other industries, such as automotive, have seen massive changes. The challenge for pharma is to make the medicines of the future.”
Ireland may have the top manufacturers in the world in this sector but the fact is that “the manufacturing plant of today may not be the manufacturing plant of the future”, says O’Halloran. He too points to the convergence of pharmaceuticals and medical devices, as well as developments in “ambient assisted living” aimed at improving the quality of life of older people as likely to have an impact on the manufacturing sector here.
This might see, for example, an ageing population prompted to take its medication by software or using medical devices that are linked directly to a pharmaceutical company. However the future of life sciences pans out, we’re going to need a highly educated and skilled working population if we are to remain at the forefront of manufacturing it.
“We’re living longer, pharma will be different and life sciences has to respond to that change,” says O’Halloran. “There will be huge opportunities for various disciplines, such as med tech and pharma, to work together, and academia is the perfect place to do that.”
Ireland must “continue to develop and invest its infrastructure and people for the life sciences to compete on the international stage”, says Abbvie’s Mairead Dunne.
The company, in partnership with The Irish Times, will later this month convene a roundtable meeting of representatives from educational institutions, science, development and business organisations to discuss the current landscape of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (Stem) in Ireland.
Its focus will be on the opportunities and challenges in Stem education, how to challenge and overcome negative perceptions of Stem in education and how to Ireland can ensure that it has the talent pipeline to continue to attract investment into the future.
“As a country on the periphery of Europe, we need to be competitive and innovative on all fronts. Ireland also needs to encourage an environment where it produces a highly skilled workforce in disciplines that will form the pipeline for our future talent,” says Dunne.
