Postgraduate Course: Biobusiness (PGSP11331)
Course Outline
| School | School of Social and Political Science |
College | College of Humanities and Social Science |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | A number of regions across the world are considered to be at the forefront of life science research. When it comes to the commercial exploitation of bioscience and biotechnology, however, the results are often disappointing. Often the approach adopted consists of attempts to turn scientists into entrepreneurs by providing them with basic training in business, (planning, small business finance and patent/licensing strategy) and showing them how these can be used in combination with their scientific skills.
While teaching scientists how to exploit commercial opportunities constitutes a legitimate motivation for business training, the ambition and target audience of this course are much wider. Turning science into innovative products and services requires not only basic training in business but also a more fundamental understanding of how scientific advances contribute to, and influence, industrial structures, innovation, and the dynamics of collaboration and competition at the level of the single industrial sector. Furthermore, in the context of the bioeconomy, innovation processes interact with, and can be shaped by, existing and evolving institutions and social attitudes and perceptions. Finally, this point of view is required not only by scientists, but also by a wider group of professionals working for government, industry and public research organisations.
This course is designed to provide students with a comprehensive overview of and the ability to assess how innovation in the life sciences is changing production methods, industrial structures, market dynamics and strategic decision making. To fully grasp these issues inevitably involves tackling the complex ethical and legal issues that individuals and society face as a result of these changes. |
| Course description |
This course provides students with a comprehensive overview of and the ability to assess how innovation in the life sciences is changing production methods, industrial structures, market dynamics and strategic decision making. Through the course we investigate, through recent and relevant case studies and examples, the systemic character of discoveries in the life sciences, developments in medical technology, advances in areas such as agro-bio, bio-fuels and bio-materials, and how these changes are reshaping the bio economy in critical fields such as healthcare, agriculture and synthetic biology. Emphasis is placed on the analysis of specific contemporary matters such as changes in regulation, structural change in pharmaceutical drug R&D, the emergence of new methods of knowledge and technology translation in the medical arena, and the variety of ways in which risk capital supports bio-related innovation.
Outline Content
1. Evolution and Natural Selection in the Pharma Industry: This session evaluates the origins genesis and evolution of the pharmaceutical industry from its earliest roots to what we see today. The factors driving the evolution of the industry are examined and assessed.
2. The Economics and Regulation of Pharma R&D. This session gives an overview of the economics of conventional pharma R&D and the standard value chain that operates for conventional small-molecule blockbuster drugs and the challenges facing that model.
3. Translational, Stratified, Personalised, Orphan or Mega Generic. How will your Medicine be delivered? Over the last 20 years different proposed models for the delivery of advance in medical science have emerged. The landscape giving rise to the emergence of these new modalities is examined and the supportive environment needed to sustain the establishment of the new models evaluated.
4. Synthetic Biology. This session gives an introduction to Synthetic Biology outlines how viable products and new markets may arise from it in the future with reference to specific developments.
5. Bio business in Emerging Economies: The Case of African Ag-Bio. This session looks at the African Agri-biotechnology sector and explores the dynamics and challenges surrounding the sector's technological development in emerging economies.
6. Animal Biotechnology - Does a Controversial Technology have a Commercial Future? This session looks at the scientific developments in applications of biotechnology to animals in the contexts of producing pharmaceuticals and farmed livestock.
7. Mapping Value Systems and Business Models in Agricultural Biotech This session describes the Innogen approach to the analysis of innovation systems through research on the agro-biotechnology industry sector.
8. Innovation in Industrial Biotechnology: The Case of Biofuels. This session examines the scientific and economic drivers of biofuels innovation, production and commercialisation, while taking into account financial, institutional and societal concerns and constraints.
9. Products of Biotechnology: Regulation and Risk Assessment. This session looks at the current biotechnology and biosafety situation in a variety of different industrial and institutional contexts.
10. Starting a Biobusiness? In this session you will hear from entrepreneurs/financiers who have taken the bold step of starting a Biobusiness and how the finance and regulatory environment shaped their business plans.
The course is delivered through a 10-week lecture and seminar discussion format given by both invited expert practitioners and University staff. The two-hour sessions will typically consist of a lecture of an hour introducing the key themes of the week's topic and the core readings provided, followed by an hour of discussion and questions. Each week's class will typically cover conceptual, theoretical and empirical material related to the topic. Discussion with staff and with others on the course is a key element in learning.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | None |
| High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
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| Academic year 2016/17, Available to all students (SV1)
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Quota: 45 |
| Course Start |
Semester 2 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
200
(
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
196 )
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| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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| Additional Information (Assessment) |
Assessment is by a final essay of 4000 words and a list of essay titles will be provided. Some essay questions may focus on a particular week's topic, while others may cover a broad range of issues covered throughout the course. Alternatively, students may choose their own question/topic for the assessment, but this must be agreed with the course organiser and students should discuss this at the earliest opportunity. |
| Feedback |
Formative, non-assessed feedback will be provided on a 1-2 page essay plan submitted during the course. |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Have a critical understanding of policy, economic and social issues shaping innovation in the life sciences and hence reshaping a number of industrial sectors, and be ability to analyse industrial trends, examine competitive and collaborative strategies, compare business development trajectories, and assess management strategies.
- Be able to demonstrate knowledge and understanding of Industry/Product life cycle analysis, develop a critical understanding of the theories and concepts about the different phases through which an industry normally evolves and how production and commercial strategy can be organised to meet the competitive challenges posed by each phase.
- Possess extensive, detailed and critical knowledge of different business development methods in the context of various sub-sectors of the bioeconomy.
- Be effective communicators about critical aspects of strategic management in sectors characterised by complex ethical and legal issues of which there are many in the bioeconomy, if not in all sectors, and be able to plan and execute a strategic analysis of options for open innovation examined from the alternative perspectives of open source, open innovation, knowledge markets, and closed approaches to intellectual property and knowledge management.
- Be able to use critical knowledge and skills related to organizational management, including how organisations translate human capital into intellectual capital, recognise their firms competence base and organisational capacity, and integrate these factors into a strategy for marketable products and services.
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Reading List
Avnimelech G. and M. Teubal, 2006, ¿Creating VC industries which co-evolve with High Tech: Insights from an Extended Industry Life Cycle (ILC) perspective to the Israeli Experience¿, Research Policy, 15, no. 4-5: 289-299
Castle D (2009), The Role of Intellectual Property Rights in Biotechnology Innovation, Edward Elgar Publisher, Cheltenham UK/Northampton USA
Chataway J and Wield D (2006), ¿The Governance of Agro- and Pharmaceutical Biotechnology Innovation: Public Policy and Industrial Strategy, Technology Analysis & Strategic Management, 18 (2), 169¿185.
Chataway J, Tait J and Wield D (2007) ¿Frameworks for Pharmaceutical Innovation in Developing Countries - The Case of Indian Pharma¿ Technology Analysis and Strategic Management,19 (5), 697-708.
Chataway J, Tait J, Wield, D (2004) Understanding company R&D strategies in agro-biotechnology: trajectories and blind spots, Research Policy, 33 (6-7), 1041-1057.
Cooke P (2007), Growth Cultures: The global bioeconomy and its bioregions, London and N. Y.: Routledge.
DiMasi J.A, Hansen R.W and Grabowski H.G, 2003, The Price of Innovation: New Estimates of Drug Development Costs, Journal of Health Economics, 22, 151-185.
Gompers P and Lerner J (2001), The Venture Capital Revolution, Journal of Economic Perspectives, 15(2), 145-168
Haffner M.E, 2006, Adopting Orphan Drugs ¿ Two Dozen Years of Treating Rare Diseases, The New England Journal of Medicine, 354, 445-447.
International Food Policy Research Institute (2006). Bioenergy and Agriculture: Promises and Challenges. 2020 Vision for Food, Agriculture, and the Environment: Focus 14, December 2006; available at http://www.ifpri.org/2020/focus/focus14/focus14.pdf
Kola I. and Landis J, 2004, Can the pharmaceutical industry reduce attrition rates?, Nature Reviews Drug Discovery, 3, 711-716.
Milne C.P, 2002, Orphan Drugs, Pain Relief for Clinical Development Headaches, Nature Biotechnology, 20, 780-784.
Milne, C.P. and Tait, J., 2009, Evolution along the Government-Governance Continuum: FDA¿s Orphan Products and Fast Track Programs as Exemplars of ¿What Works¿ for Innovation and Regulation, Food and Drug Law Journal, 64(4), 733-753.
Mittra J (2008), Impact of the life sciences on organisation and management of R&D in large pharmaceutical firms, IJBT, 10(5) 416-440.
Mittra J and Tait J (2010) From maturity to value-added innovation: lessons from the pharmaceutical and agro-biotechnology industries, Trends in Biotechnology, 29(3), 105-109.
Northrup J, 2005, The pharmaceutical sector. In: Burns R L (Ed), The Business of Healthcare Innovation, Cambridge University Press
Pardridge, W, M. (2003) ¿Translational Science: What is it and Why is it so Important?¿ Drug Discovery Today, 18, 813-815
Pew Initiative on Food and Biotechnology (2001) Harvest on the Horizon: Future Uses of Agricultural Biotechnology, available at http://pewagbiotech.org/research/harvest/harvest.pdf
Pisano G. P., 2006, The Science Business: The Promise, the Reality, and the Future of Biotech, Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.
Porter K Whittington K B Powell W W., 2005, ¿The Institutional Embeddedness of High-Tech Regions: Relational Foundations of the Boston Biotechnology Community¿, in eds S Breschi and F Malerba, Clusters, Networks, and Innovation, Oxford University Press
Rasmussen B, 2010, Innovation and Commercialisation in the Biopharmaceutical Industry, Edward and Elgar, Cheltenham (UK) and Northampton MA (USA).
Rosiello A, and Parris S (2009) ¿The patterns of venture capital investment in the UK bio-healthcare sector: the role of proximity, cumulative learning and specialisation¿, Venture Capital, an International Journal in Entrepreneurial Finance, Volume 11, Issue 3, 185-212.
Rothaermel FT and Deeds DL (2004) Exploration and exploitation alliances in biotechnology: a system of new product development, Strategic Management Journal, 15, 201-221.
Schimd E. F and Smith A, (2005) Is Declining Innovation in the Pharmaceutical Industry a Myth? Drug Discovery Today, 10 (15), 1031-1038.
Tait. J (2007), Systemic Interactions in Life Science Innovation. Technology Analysis and Strategic Management, 19(3), 257-277, May 2007.
UN-Energy (2007) Sustainable Bioenergy: A Framework for Decision Makers, available at http://esa.un.org/un-energy/pdf/susdev.Biofuels.FAO.pdf.
Vertès, A.A., Inui, M. & Yukawa, H. (2006) Implementing biofuels on a global scale, Nature Biotechnology 24, 761¿764. |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Not entered |
| Keywords | Not entered |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Ms Mariam Huzair
Tel: (0131 6)50 6386
Email: farah.huzair@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Miss Kate Ferguson
Tel: (0131 6)51 5122
Email: kate.ferguson@ed.ac.uk |
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