Flexibility & efficiency allow small pharma to innovate and take risks

Big Pharma has never been renowned for innovation. Rather, large pharmaceutical companies have traditionally focused on developing and testing conventional therapeutics, such as small molecule drugs and monoclonal antibodies, building and investing in the substantial infrastructure required to support these efforts.

"They are best known for their sales and marketing expertise, not for their innovation and development of novel technologies," said Edward Lanphier, president and CEO of biotherapeutics company Sangamo BioSciences Inc.

"Historically, development of new technologies and novel platforms has been the domain of small biotech companies."

Flexible and quick on their feet: advantages of pharmaceutical SMEs

As medicine advances and the mapping of individuals’ genomes becomes increasingly commonplace, leading to the development of therapies tailored to each patient’s genetic make-up and disease, small pharma’s flexibility, creativity and scientific expertise is set to become key to the development of the pharmaceutical industry.

"There is an increased demand for innovative medicines and we expect that the demand for personalised medicines will create numerous opportunities for companies like Sangamo, which are poised to exploit these opportunities," Lanphier confirmed.

"Small biotechs are usually very lean and can move more adroitly and efficiently, and at less cost, during the discovery and initial development of new drugs," said Peter Kiener, CEO of biotherapeutics company Zyngenia, in agreement.

"They are also more willing to take on risk and can explore new, unproven opportunities that have the potential to be game changers if they are successful."

"They are not constrained by the bureaucracy that characterizes large organizations, which allows a level of creativity that is often constrained in large companies," added Tom Saylor, chairman of EuropaBio’s SME Platform and CEO of formulation technology company Arecor.