Do we really need to do market research? Isn’t our technology so good that people will buy it anyway? If you look back at our previous blogs you’ll see our thinking on the need for market research before commercialisation and it’s a definitive YES!
But what kind of research should it be? Finding out what somebody else already knows? Or discovering something that no-one knew before? We firmly believe that carrying out primary research is what sets a project apart in terms of its future commercial potential. And by primary research we mean talking to potential stakeholders – yes, I said talking to them! This includes potential customers, collaborators and where you can, competitors too.
Don’t get me wrong, there’s a very important place for secondary research in terms of setting the scene and understanding the context but it’s finding out what someone already knows; top down consensus. It’s all very well knowing that the general widget market grew by 20% in 2010 and that it’s worth £x billion but that doesn’t tell you how your product is going to perform in the widget market, whether people are going to buy it and how much they’ll pay. It doesn’t tell you that if you’d produced it in blue rather than black then more people would have bought it – I’m being flippant but you get the gist….
Primary research is about original data gained by interaction with a relevant group of people. It’s about asking questions that are specific to a product or market and interpreting and analyzing the information against unique criteria to find out whether it’s a real innovation opportunity. It’s the best way of evaluating your market opportunity; understanding the competitive landscape; gaining an accurate understanding of critical influences and using it to shape your commercialisation strategy.
As we enter the second decade of the millennium, perhaps it is time to discard the business models of the early nineties which were based on the formation of expensive corporate structures driving a deep R&D pipeline reliant on multiple VC financing rounds (series E and beyond) followed by an IPO or a trade sale to provide the investors with a return. Now, perhaps the time is right to accept alternative business models, some of which have been tried and tested and proven to work over the last few economically constrained years. Perhaps it is now time to think about flexible project based financing where virtual companies and flexible management teams drive a single or limited number of projects so that more can be achieved for less investment. This is something which could benefit research institutes and bodies who could spin out more projects for a limited pool of finance. This will result in more IP commercialised and in turn would create more employment in the sector, albeit employment with a strong project management slant. The virtual nature of such business models would also create more ‘activity’ in the service sector with a greater flow of project work to CROs for example and again this would create employment and expand the sector.
But, the key question remains, who is going to finance this new era? The funding mechanism for today needs to be a combination of non-dilutive government grants, visionary angels and high net worths and new specialist investment funds – we are at last starting to see increasing investment activity from corporate venture funds such as those from Roche, Lundbeck and Novo. This is already happening and if the VC funds want to survive they have to be more accepting of the importance of some of these funding elements such as high net worth individuals than they are currently.
So, as befitting a bioscience industry, the dinosaur business model of the 90’s may be extinct and a new, nimble, cost efficient, stronger species is emerging to take its place. Only the better ideas will be financed, capital efficiency will drive lower equity intensity and in a few years when this crop of new start-up projects mature they’ll be in a ‘seller’s market’ given the limited number of other players.
The reports of the death of biotech are, therefore, greatly exaggerated.
In the 19th century, following the incorrect reporting of his demise, Mark Twain sent a cable to the Associated Press stating “The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated”. As a result of a number of articles published over the last month, which report the decline in venture capital investment in life science companies, you could be forgiven for sounding the death knells for the biotech industry. However, as politicians in both the US and Europe have stated, this industry is highly significant for economic growth in western countries in the coming decades, so hopefully we are seeing the long overdue transition to new funding cycles and new business models rather than the slow death of a sector.
For the past three decades, growth in the pharmaceutical industry has been heavily dependent on its ability to launch a stream of new drugs or improved drugs to meet poorly served medical needs. Over the past two decades, small research driven biotechnology companies have been responsible for filling the drug development pipeline of the large, established multi-nationals who, despite eye-wateringly large R&D spends, rarely seem to be able to match the efficiency of the small fast moving innovators. Sadly, however, for many years the industry has relied upon the VCs and (for some) the public equity markets to finance the biotech minnows. The big pharmas have then been able to swoop in and acquire products and companies once a lot of the R&D heavy lifting has been done and the projects have been de-risked using private and public equity finance.
Unfortunately, with no or limited access to the public markets and with big pharma increasingly reluctant to license early stage projects, investors in early stage businesses are facing a long return horizon and for many, in these financially constrained times, the risk/return ratio is unacceptable. According to an article in Bloomberg (6.10.11) almost 40% of 150 US VC firms have decreased their investment in life sciences during the past three years and the same proportion expect to continue the reduction in spending over the next three years. Add to this the fact that, because of the poor returns experienced by many VC funds investing in the sector and the tough economic climate, VC firms are finding it difficult to raise new money and are therefore focussed on transacting their existing investee companies which in turn reduces the number of companies ‘alive and kicking’. If this is happening in the US you can rest assured that the situation in Europe is even worse, where VCs are even more reluctant to invest. If we extrapolate these investment drivers it is possible to conclude that fewer companies will be formed due to a dearth of finance, there will be less innovation in the industry pipeline and there will not be a new pool of entrepreneurial talent emerging to lead the biotech industry in the future.
So, should we start playing a funeral march or are we witnessing a new era for biotech?
The US Government recently announced a series of measures it will implement in 2012 under the headline of a ‘Bioeconomy Blueprint’designed to “harness biological research innovations to address national challenges in health, food energy and the environment”. The initiative will apparently include changes in regulatory policy to facilitate the translation of research to commercialisation, plans for workforce development and new translational science public-private partnerships. These initiatives go hand-in-hand with the recent NIH/FDA patent initiative for start up companies.
The US leads the way in life sciences research and life sciences investment. Small companies already have access to significant levels of R&D funding from the NIH, FDA and state governments to drive innovation and product development and now it appears that innovative businesses are going to receive further assistance.
In the UK successive governments over the last 20 years have talked about the importance of the knowledge based economy as a means of kick starting economic development and growth. There have been arguable successes such as the introduction of R&D tax credits and entrepreneur tax relief but direct, financial assistance to R&D based businesses is limited unless it happens to be in regions highlighted as needing economic development. We are all aware of the debt mountain that we need to demolish but we also know that business growth (and therefore government investment) can play a vital role in leading us out of the current economic crisis. The life sciences industry can play a part in – clearly recognised by the US government. If we are to better utilise our knowledge economy we too, in the UK, need to corral government support and direction to accelerate the translation of our strong academic research base into employment generating businesses.
Eli Lilly and Co. recently launched an Open Innovation Drug Discovery program, under which they plan to offer free compound screening to scientists or organizations outside the company, in exchange for first rights to negotiate a collaboration or licensing deal for screened candidates. The program expands on Lilly’s Phenotypic Drug Discovery Initiative that was launched in 2009.
Under the programme, scientists can submit a molecule via the program’s website. If the molecule meets specified requirements, Lilly will screen it in a series of biological assay panels to evaluate its uniqueness and potential to be further optimized into a drug candidate. If no deal is reached with Lilly, the submitting scientist retains rights to the compound and screening data.
Whilst the cynics amongst us could argue that this is again an example of big pharma doing research at someone else’s expense, perhaps we should welcome the opportunity for researchers to get the fruits of their research labours into the hands of industrial researchers quicker and easier without compromising their IP ownership. Also, could university technology transfer departments operate something similar but on a smaller scale, whereby they actively promote compounds which have been shown to have some commercial importance on their web sites and make these compounds available for a fixed period of time under a standard material transfer agreement to potential industrial partners? Could this accelerate that all important translation of science into industry?
There’s been a lot of debate recently about Easy Access IP and the position universities should take regarding their intellectual property. The initiative is – amongst other things – about kick starting economic growth and looking for a new model for managing university IP – all good stuff. Universities can make available some of their IP free of charge to industry although they can also still channel high value IP through the traditional routes of licensing or spin outs. Arguments in favour focus on universities as publicly funded institutions sharing knowledge freely for the benefits to the economy. Those against argue that a streamlined process will be less rigorous and open to problems in future.
As is often the case, perhaps the optimum lies somewhere in between. Many Universities invest significant levels of expenditure in creating extensive IP estates which never see the commercial light of day. Also, many SMEs have neither the time nor patience to try and persuade Universities or research bodies to license out their IP through what is often a slow, risk averse and bureaucratic process however there is general agreement that the UK is dependent on ‘new’ technologies or home grown ‘intellectual capital’ for future economic growth and employment.
If IP is ‘given away’, rather like not having to pay for admission to a night club, where is the incentive to go and if you go is there an incentive to stay the course? Therefore should there be an Easy Access IP Mark where all IP generated by Government funded research is made available (not just the IP the University doesn’t know what to do with) for free without an upfront charge? The sting being that the IP is only available for a fixed period of time to prevent the licensee sitting on it and not commercialising it and when the licensee makes money from the IP there is a minimum royalty payable back to the University. Food for thought perhaps.
Who needs marketing? If an invention is innovative enough surely it sells itself doesn’t it? Among countless others, Ralph Waldo Emerson famously agreed with the above sentiment:
“If a man can make a better mousetrap than his neighbour, the world will make a beaten path to his door.”
The problem with this is that it was written in 1885 so it’s 126 years out of date! We can’t have 19th century marketing principles applied to a 21st century market, it’s simply bad practise. Many marketers will tell you that it’s in fact a backwards view of marketing; the company should make a beaten path to their customers’ doors! Technology doesn’t always win; if communication isn’t optimised then you can be sure sales aren’t. This is the essence of marketing, however, there’s a lot more to marketing than sales.
During our time spent working with science based companies we’ve found they face several challenges – knowledge of technology but lack of knowledge of marketing and business development; lack of marketing resources – people and money; lack of strategic direction – all leading to lack of customers. Time and time again we see so much untapped potential as a result of companies not addressing their marketing issues. However innovative and differentiated the product is, it must still be marketed, indeed, the more innovative and potentially ‘disruptive’, the more marketing that needs to be done. Good branding, messaging and communications together with excellent levels of customer services create a more valuable, desirable, easier to accept ‘Whole Product’ (Theodore Levitt’s concept – the saviour of many technology companies) increasing competitive advantage and rate of uptake by prospective customers
We’re very excited that this is our first blog post! In future we will be adding what we hope are interesting comments, opinions and insights on anything to do with life sciences, commercialising technologies, technology marketing and a whole range of other things.
So watch this space!
