Joseph Damond: “Catalonia is one of the three most dynamic hubs in healthcare and life sciences worldwide”

Joseph Damond, Executive Vice President for International Affairs at the Biotechnology Innovation Organization (BIO. Mr. Damond is responsible for developing and implementing the industry association’s international advocacy and outreach program, including the areas of trade policy and foreign government relations. Prior to taking up this position at BIO, Mr. Damond was vice president for International Government Relations in Pfizer’s Washington office from 2006-2011.
 

At Spain’s kick-off reception at the BIO International Convention, you said Catalonia is one of the three most dynamic hubs in healthcare and the life sciences, along with San Francisco and Massachusetts. Why do you think this?

Catalonia is certainly prepared to become an important dynamic hub. It's not yet where San Francisco and Massachusetts are, but it's already showing that it can be a trustworthy biotechnology start-up ecosystem. The presence it had at this year's BIO event is an important sign of this and also shows that it’s prepared to move on to the next stage: boosting international connections, presenting the Catalan project abroad and investing in marketing to get global traction.

Would you recommend anything to the Catalan healthcare and life sciences sector in order to strengthen its leadership?

Attending events such as BIO is a strategy not to be left behind. It's one of the best ways to learn more about the best practices used in hubs like San Francisco and Boston. What conditions allowed them to grow despite their handicaps? How did they become a powerful hub? All of these questions need to be answered in order to reach a certain critical mass and then open up to the global community.

What we're seeing in San Francisco and Boston are hubs that have been around for a while, they’re kind of self-sustained enterprises. The government isn't really involved now; they are promoted through global investors and researchers who have found their place there and are attracting more people. That can't happen overnight but I think this is really where you want to end up.

What’s the BIO International Convention’s opinion about the current state of the life sciences sector globally?

J would highlight three major considerations. On the scientific side, this is an era of unprecedented promise. The US has just approved the first gene-editing technology to treat early stage leukemia and there's so much more coming in the pipeline to address unmet medical needs. We're in a golden age and Catalonia can definitely get in there because the technology is in its early stages, so there's an opportunity to get in on the ground floor now.

The second thing is that governments everywhere are still figuring out how they are going to pay for this technology because it's not cheap to develop. All of this is investor driven through venture capital. Some of these drugs, while promising, target only a small part of the population. That's one of the reasons why the price is so high. The real uncertainty of investors and developers is whether governments are going to be willing to pay for this technology once it's developed. I know that in Catalonia you face financial constraints, as do many other places in Europe, and that can affect investors’ willingness to put money into the sector. Nobody has a solution to this yet, but we are trying to come up with an idea of how society might pay for this technology.

The third uncertainty is whether regulatory systems can keep up and adapt to this new technology. Regulatory approval was developed in the context of chemically created drugs, which needed large populations involved in clinical trials. But the old model doesn't really work for newer medicines, which are genetically engineered for specific issues. I know they are working on creating faster and more efficient pathways but there is still more to do in this area. Obviously, if you can find a more efficient way to do clinical trials you can lower costs.

What do you think will be the main topics discussed at next year’s BIO International Convention?

I think we'll see a continuation: How do we address the equation of compensating the advances of new technology? How will society be willing to do that? The discussion will also continue about regulatory advances, reforms. One issue that affects you directly in Catalonia is how the European Medicines Agency is going to work after Brexit. I know Barcelona wants it to move there and that would be a big deal, obviously, but it raises questions in America, of course, about how it is going to work outside the UK because it's already difficult to get drugs approved in Europe and in the US.