Japanese biotech companies may reside at Science Center

BYLINE: Peter Key

The Science Center is getting ready to play host to some young Japanese biotechnology companies to see which ones it wants to help set up and grow on its property in Philadelphia's University City section.

The economic-development nonprofit is working through the Japan External Trade Organization, or JETRO, to have 10 early-stage Japanese biotech companies visit its headquarters, technology park and incubator early next year.

"We are partnering with JETRO to select the companies," said Pradip Banerjee, the Science Center's president and CEO.

Banerjee would be happy if the Science Center found two or three of the companies worth inviting to establish a U.S. presence on its property. If any of the companies do locate in the Science Center, they would probably employ only one or two people at first, making their initial economic impact negligible. The hope would be that they would grow over time with the Science Center's help, which could include money from its venture capital fund.

The Science Center calls its strategy of providing space and other assistance -- for which it is paid -- to small life sciences companies that want to do business in the United States its soft-landing strategy.

Its biggest effort in that area is with JETRO, with which it signed an agreement earlier this year. Under that, JETRO designated the Science Center as a so-called Tiger Gate, making it one of four incubators JETRO has in the country and JETRO's preferred location for Japanese biotech firms looking to break into the United States.

Japan has about 500 biotechnology start-ups, according to Yoji Ueda, the director of technology research for JETRO's New York office.

The Science Center also has agreements under its soft-landing strategy with Belgium and the Rhone-Alps region of France and is close to reaching one with Scotland.

The soft-landing strategy fits into the Science Center's plan to move from being primarily a landlord to small, young technology and life sciences companies to being what Banerjee calls a venture ecosystem. In that role, the organization not only provides those kinds of companies with all the assistance they need to grow, but invests in them and sometimes even starts them.

If the companies succeed, they provide the Science Center with money by expanding the amount of space they rent from it and by giving it a good return on its investments. That enables the Science Center to increase its activities, which it hopes boosts its income even more.

The overall idea is to combine the technology developed by the Science Center's owners, which consist of the University of Pennsylvania and 29 other colleges and research institutions, with the area's strengths in life sciences to make the Science Center a self-funding engine of economic growth for the region.

Through the soft-landing strategy, the Science Center hopes to use young, foreign companies with promising technology that want to locate in the United States to provide some of that growth.

"When they come here, they grow here and that creates new and high-paying jobs for our region," said Larry Aguelnick, the Science Center's chief of staff.

Many parts of the world have life sciences technology that's as good as that developed in the United States, Banerjee said. But life sciences companies, no matter where they're located, need to market their products in the United States to succeed.

The Science Center can help them do that in many ways, including helping them navigate the regulatory maze they have to go through to get their products approved for sale in this country.

In addition to getting foreign companies to locate on its property, the Science Center may help them license their technology to other companies already on its property or to a new company it forms to develop the technology for use in this country.

The Science Center's agreement with JETRO calls for the latter organization to help it spot companies with promising technology in Japan. Banerjee said the Science Center is looking for technology that can be turned into products and that is patent protected.

Of the 10 visiting Japanese companies, the organization would consider it a success to get two or three companies to set up shop in Philadelphia, he said.