and something more recent...I’m not sure if this has been posted before, but I think it offers some behind the scenes insights not often found here so its worth another look if it has been previously posted.
From Alberta Inventors & Innovations…
“Alberta's biotech leaders face their business challenges with a resounding theme of creativity and faith in what they term as good science - embracing the odds in an industry known for more than its share of failures. The five firms interviewed for this story are among a short list of companies pioneering the biotech industry in the prairies, a place only recently tagged as a locale for the white coats of the industry to conjunct.
Financing
As visionary gamblers familiar with investing and crossing fingers to see how the returns will shake loose, Alberta's farmers and oil industry workers have an innate understanding of the biotech industry, says Brad Thompson, president and CEO of Calgary's Oncolytics Biotech Inc. (TSX:ONC, NASDAQ:ONCY), a company working on a viral treatment for prostate cancer. But that appreciation does not necessarily reach up into the government's list of priorities.
Public biotechs across Canada compete on a fairly level playing field, rising and falling with the strength of the stock market, says Thompson. But the field tilts jurisdictionally. "Half the biotech in this country is in Quebec and it's there for a reason... because the (Quebec) government has made a commitment to biotech and has made it very easy to raise money through government-backed venture capital." Governmental help includes grants and loans through the Quebec pension plan.
"We don't have that here," says Thompson. "It's just not ideologically on the page in Alberta to have that kind of commitment to non-energy." He adds that people get "twitchy over outright grants to industry" but insists there are many creative ways to structure incentives such as investment agreements and repayable loans. Thompson's touch of envy for Quebec's biotech environment seems to be echoed by the industry throughout Alberta.
"It could change overnight, but as an individual company I'm not about to go out and go through the process of trying to change it," says Thompson. What he will do is make sure Oncolytics' intellectual property is properly patented. An oversight in patenting can cause a successful drug to fail as a result of immediate competition in its specific arena.”
Comment - who needs to worry about financing when you have a breakthrough cancer treatment & cannacord? An apparent unbeatable combination - No sense then in trying to tap the US market even if most of BT’s time is spent doing investor roadshows there?
Staffing
"Ultimately it's the scientist who is the core (of the industry) and they are coming out of Alberta in a very prolific manner," says Geise. If he can, he will keep as much of the growth in the province as possible.
Oncolytics' Thompson is not so upbeat, saying that if the core of a company is in the province but the bulk of its employees are elsewhere, it won't do much for the province. His company is a prime example, with eight full-time employees—seven in Alberta and one in Ontario, and 40 or 50 others who earn their living through Oncolytics on a contract basis but are mostly located in the U.S.
Thompson has friends in the industry in San Francisco who have worked at five or six different companies without having to move, meaning their kids can stay in their schools and spouses don't have to change jobs. "If you come to Calgary's biotech you don't have that network. You work for Oncolytics for four or five years and then if you want to go to work for somebody else you have to move again."
Though the income tax environment is positive in the province, it's not enough to entice many. "At some point – and Oncolytics is pretty close to that point -you say the majority of our human resource growth won't be here," says Thompson. "Do we think that Biomira will actually become a fully integrated pharmaceutical company in Alberta? Unlikely. Do we think that Isotechnika will, now that they've signed with Roche? No."
Indeed, the drug development industry in the province does not appear poised to make the turn from categorically focused biotech companies to the more diverse world of major pharmaceuticals.”
https://collections.ic.gc.ca/abinvents/innovation/technologytransfer/technology_spin-off_profiles_article2.htm#
wonder what those 40 or 50 other contract employees do? are they employed by the contract manufacturers producing vast quantities of reovirus that won't be needed for years based on how current & previous clinical trials have gone?