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Patterns of technological innovation in biotech

Nature Biotechnology volume 30, pages 937–943 (2012)Cite this article

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Applying theories of innovation to biotech; an analysis of the evolution of three classes of therapeutic biotechnologies.

The defining feature of the biotech industry is that it is both closely aligned with advances in basic biological science and also focused on developing medical products to satisfy challenging standards of efficacy, safety, profit and even economic impact. From its inception in the 1970s, there have been high expectations that biotech would generate new classes of biological products for previously untreatable diseases, reverse the declining productivity of the pharmaceutical industry with new approaches to drug discovery and development, and provide returns on investments competitive with those of other technology sectors. Although there are salient success stories in both product development and process improvement, the overall performance of the biotech industry has been disappointing in terms of generating new products and financial performance1,2.

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Figure 1: Stages of the technology life cycle and theories of innovation.
Figure 2: Technological innovation in SGT.
Figure 3: Technological innovation in ONTs.
Figure 4: Technological innovation in MATs.
Figure 5: A plot of phase 1 initiation dates for approved MATs and S-curve of publications on MATs.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported, in part, by the ACTA Foundation and the National Biomedical Research Foundation. The authors thank J. Janice Reichert (Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development) for her generous consultation and sharing data on mAb development, I. Morgan (Finance Department, Bentley University) for his invaluable insights into biotech finance and management, and our colleagues and students for their many comments and insights. This work was presented, in part, at the Advances in Biopharmaceuticals, Keystone Symposia, 2010.

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  1. Laura M. McNamee and Fred D. Ledley are in the Center for Integration of Science and Industry, Bentley University, Waltham, Massachusetts, USA.,

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Correspondence to Fred D Ledley.

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McNamee, L., Ledley, F. Patterns of technological innovation in biotech. Nat Biotechnol 30, 937–943 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nbt.2389

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