C. COPENHAGEN CAPACITY

A bridge spanning the Øresund Sound now connects biotech companies in southern Sweden and northern Denmark. Associations with local universities tie the companies to the area, and a plethora of venture capital funds fuel them. But for Medicon Valley's growing body of biotech companies to take off, they need one more resource that is in increasingly short supply — scientists.

"The bottleneck used to be venture capital," says Anker Lundemose, chief executive of Pantheco, a Danish biotech company. "The bottleneck now is human resources." About 2,000 R&D employees work in the region's 96 companies. But the growth in both new companies and venture funds means that more scientists will be needed.

The area must attract more talent from beyond what has traditionally been a fairly insular community, say area bankers, biotech executives and university administrators. And it will also need to retain the best and brightest PhDs produced by the concentration of universities that created the Medicon Valley Academy — the organization that basically organized the region's biotech into one operational unit (see Nature 395, 412–413; 1999).

Pointing the finger: Pantheco chief executive Anker Lundemose pinpoints the shortage of scientists as the major bottleneck to biotech growth.

Claus Braestrup, executive vice-president, R&D, of Lundbeck, the Copenhagen-based pharmaceutical firm, says companies will need to look outward more but successful overtures to researchers in other countries may not be easy. "There are major obstacles for people coming in to Denmark," Bræstrup says. "One is the taxes; another is the weather."

Denmark has already begun to address the tax system, which levies rates as high as 62% for the best-paid scientists. Last year, it established an 'expert' bracket, which allows out-of-country workers with skills in demand to pay only 25% for three years.

The country had a similar programme before, but it only applied to the highest-paid positions — and anyone deciding to stay on after three years was required to pay back the difference. More people are eligible under the new system, and the assimilation penalty no longer applies. But the tax break can cause resentment among co-workers who pay the higher rates, Bræstrup says.

Lundbeck has recruited extensively outside the country — adding 117 R&D workers in the past year and doubling its research budget in the past two. The company is especially short on organic chemists and bioinformatics experts.

Cold comfort: the long, dark Scandinavian winter can deter scientists from warmer regions, says Kirsten Drejer, chief executive of Symphogen.

Kirsten Drejer, chief executive of Symphogen, a Danish biotech company specializing in developing human antibodies to viruses, says she is having an especially hard time finding senior people. She agrees with Bræstrup that the Scandinavian weather — especially the long, dark winter — can make it hard to recruit scientists from warm sunny regions such as California. "On the other hand, it's very safe," says Søren Mouritsen, chief executive of M&E Biotech, one of the first Danish biotech companies. He tries to emphasize to recruits that the area is considered to offer excellent quality of life.

Retaining talent

Meanwhile, some scientists who were trained in the area are reluctant to whole-heartedly embrace industry. "The public researcher is still a little bit shy about collaborating with private investors," says Hans Poulsen, chief executive of Odin Medical, a Copenhagen-based company that is developing nonviral gene-therapy vectors to fight cancer.

Poulsen has combated that cultural tendency by making his company into a bit of a hybrid. It is supported in part by the Danish Cancer Institute and is housed on the University of Copenhagen campus. Poulsen also expects his employees to do basic research and publish their findings. As a result of this approach, he has been successful in finding qualified candidates. It is important to offer a research setting in a non-academic environment, because academic slots have been increasingly scarce due to a dearth of government funding, Poulsen says.

Eva Degerman, from Lund University's section for molecular signalling, is concerned about a similar trend in Sweden. She would prefer not to have to rely on industry to fund her research. "I think it is important that we have our independence," she explains.

Independent streak: Lund University's Eva Degerman worries that reliance on industry for funding will result in less academic freedom.

But that may become increasingly difficult. Degerman, like many Swedish scientists, depends on government and foundation money to support her work. These funds have not been rising nearly as fast as they have in the United States, and she is worried that too much dependence on industry money will result in less freedom to publish and an over-emphasis on product over basic research.

Per Belfrage, former dean of Lund's medical school, thinks that Medicon Valley-area academic scientists who learn to interact with the region's industry can help themselves retain their independence.

For example, if industrial and academic scientists band together under the aegis of the Medicon Valley Academy, they may be able to lobby successfully for more basic biomedical funding — something scientists from both sectors say is lacking. Although the government cannot control the climate, they can do something about funding.

Medicon Valley Academy http://www.mva.org
Copenhagen Capacity http://www.copcap.com