“The Future of U.S. Biopharmaceutical Manufacturing,” is the topic of the 11:30 a.m. to 12:45 p.m., March 17 keynote address during Interphex 2009, Jacob K. Javits Center, New York. G. Steven Burrill, CEO, Burrill & Co., a San Francisco-based global leader in life sciences with activities in private equity, venture capital, merchant banking and media, will kickoff the session with his views of the future of health care and the overriding trends affecting the global industry.
“The U.S. economy is deteriorating at an alarming rate as the housing, credit and financial crises keep feeding on each other in a vicious cycle that is proving difficult for Washington policymakers to break,” Burrill said in a Feb. 2 press release. “… [W]e are witnessing a major sea change for the biotech industry as the macroeconomic environment exerts its toll.
“The future of biotech’s innovation residing in small and emerging companies is at risk. We have seen mounting evidence that companies are putting their projects ‘on ice’ and reducing staff in an attempt to ride out these brutal conditions. It remains to be seen whether these projects will ever be thawed out.
“It is clear that when the markets do return in late 2009/early 2010 we are likely to see a very different industry than exists today,” observes Burrill. “Revaluation and restructuring will now be the strategies of many companies going forward. Interestingly enough, as bad as the situation is today…it has created one of the greatest buying opportunities ever for investors, big pharma and big biotech. Trading at prices unheard of in their recent past are great companies with great products and pipelines with superb management.”
A panel discussion follows his address with senior executives from manufacturing organizations at big pharma and big biotech companies sharing their views for the future of pharmaceutical manufacturing. The panel includes: Moderator Laura Bush, editor in chief, BioPharm International; Burrill; Timothy Moore, senior vice president, Global Supply Chain, Genentech; Divakar Ramakrishnan, PhD, executive director, Manufacturing and Technology, Eli Lilly & Co.; and Michal Koweolenko, PhD, senior vice president, Biotech Operating Unit, Technical Operations and Product Supply, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals.
For more information, visit: http://www.interphex.reedexpo.com/App/homepage.cfm?moduleid=42&appname=100026.