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Strategic rethink for German biotechnology

Nature Biotechnology volume 20, pages 970–971 (2002)Cite this article

“No plan survives contact with the enemy.” Prussian field marshal Helmuth von Moltke (1800–1891)

Despite the success of the German biotechnology initiative of the late 1990s in energizing local science, creating startups, and enhancing the profile of European biotechnology1, the overall return on investment, profitability, and sustainability of these ventures have been less than impressive2. Most of these life science ventures concentrated their efforts on tools and platform technologies, the products of which have a faster time to market than drugs. They appeared to be everything that traditional pharmaceutical companies were not—and therein lay their appeal and promise, but also the seeds of their failure.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Hiroki Sawa, senior advisor to Medbase and President of Suzuka University of Health Science (Suzuka City, Japan), and Wolfgang Richter of Morphochem (Munich, Germany) for their comments.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. principals at the biotech–pharmaceutical consultancy Medbase LLC, Princeton, 08540-7302, NJ, USA

    Michael Fernandes & David Miska

Authors
  1. Michael Fernandes
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  2. David Miska
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Fernandes, M., Miska, D. Strategic rethink for German biotechnology. Nat Biotechnol 20, 970–971 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1038/nbt1002-970

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