CEO Update | Monday 22 October

New explainer videos, new R+D tax guide, Commons’ Select committee on AMR and new Scientist.com deal

It’s great to celebrate and explain our sector. Last week we launched our Celebrating UK Bioscience videos and re-vamped our Strategic Technologies webpage with fantastic new content. We generated just under half a million unique impressions on Twitter in 3 days, and I’d like you to share these resources with your network to drive better understanding of our sector and what it does.  There are five YouTube videos in total, four on the key areas of scientific focus identified by the BIA (antimicrobial resistance, genomics, cell and gene therapies, and engineering biology) and a fifth video which explores the relationship between BIA Charity of the Year 2018, Parkinson’s UK, and BIA member Benevolent AI. Do use this resource, it’s great. The need for quality materials explaining these areas of scientific importance is critical to up investor interest in our sector and ensure continued talent into our community, societal and political support for what we do. Please use of these materials on your own social media channels and websites, and please be sure to tag us on Twitter @BIA_UK. Get in touch if you’d like any other resources. They are a member benefit we’ve made a significant investment in and deserve a massive audience.  

Today the House of Commons Health Select Committee released its latest report into AMR and rightly argued the need for continued political focus on this important agenda. Our latest report and video highlights the great work being done on AMR by smaller UK companies, a point sadly overlooked in the committee’s final document. Current trends point to more AMR innovation coming from this community than from established pharma in the years ahead. AMR is a global problem which doesn’t respect boundaries. We must focus on it and incentivise the production of new antimicrobial drugs, address the market challenges around this topic, and encourage positive antimicrobial stewardship.

It was great to see so many of you at the Bioscience Forum last week and thank you for the positive feedback for what was an action-packed day and evening. I was particularly reassured to hear Sir Mark Walport committing UKRI to continuing to support the Life Sciences sector and citing the Biomedical Catalyst scheme as a success. To have Brexit sessions at both our and BioDeutschland’s events last week was demonstration of our continued close co-operation and the practical reality of our sector as a European part of a global industry. Look on Twitter for #UKBSF for a catch up on the day if you weren’t able to make it. I was able to explain that the UK life sciences ecosystem is in a fantastic place with innovation, opportunity and collaboration everywhere, in an era of profound scientific opportunity, whilst being concerned that trade and supply issues in terms of Brexit were concerning the sector.

On the day I was also proud to be able to launch our new partnership with Scientist.com. As part of our business solutions membership offering BIA members now have access to a dedicated portal on the Scientist.com marketplace, speedily connecting them with global experts and purchase custom research services required for drug R&D.  Also launched at the Bioscience Forum last week was the BIA’s new guide to R&D tax credits for SMEs. We regularly hear from members that tax credits are one of the most important forms of innovation support the government provides and we want to make sure all our members are benefitting. The new guide is an excellent explainer for new and experienced biotech entrepreneurs. Thank you to Confluence Tax and FTI Consulting for putting it together and the other members of our finance committee for their support.    

I’ll update on the AGM and Board elections in next week’s Newscast, do join us for our latest Brexit webinar on Friday afternoon, sign up for the next Brexit Lead Network on 5 November and book your table for the gala dinner on January 24^th.

Best

Steve