Orlando pins big hopes on biomed; But some doubt Central Florida will ever rival top-tier clusters such as San Diego

BYLINE: Harry Wessel, Sentinel Staff Writer

A year ago, Louis Poisson was commuting two hours each way -- via car, train and subway -- to his biotech-research job in Boston.

Lured a few months later to a similar job in Orlando, the 48-year-old flow-cytometry scientist now has a simple, 10-minute drive to his lab at VaxDesign Corp. in Central Florida Research Park.

Eight-plus years in the Northeastern cold was enough, said Poisson, a self-described warm-weather person who likes "everything" about Central Florida.

"I hope to live here forever, and I'm sure my wife seconds that," Poisson said. "I think Orlando will attract a lot of people. Once Burnham and the med school are up and running, it will attract a lot more."

Plenty of close observers of the $60 billion-a-year biomedical industry agree with Poisson, and not all of them live in Central Florida. Twin announcements in 2006 -- that the University of Central Florida would start a medical school, and the Burnham Institute for Medical Research would open an East Coast laboratory in Orlando -- have created a buzz heard across the country.

UCF's medical school and Burnham's lab are both expected to open in 2009 in Orlando's Lake Nona community as part of a planned "medical city" that will also include an undergraduate life-sciences college, a Veteran's Administration hospital, and a research facility jointly operated by Burnham and the University of Florida.

"If I were in economic development in San Diego, I'd be concerned" about Orlando, said Patrick Kelly, a spokesman for the Biotechnology Industry Organization, a trade group with more than 1,100 U.S. members.

San Diego is one of the top biomedical clusters in the country, if not the world, sharing top-tier status with metro areas such as Boston, San Francisco and North Carolina's Research Triangle.

Although Orlando may never join that rarified group, Kelly and other experts think it's only a matter of time -- likely a decade or two -- before Orlando does become a nationally recognized biomedical cluster.

Florida has invested wisely by using tax incentives to woo heavyweight research companies such as Burnham and the Scripps Research Institute, Kelly said, because research is critical to any successful cluster. Orlando's high-volume airport and roads make it easily accessible, and its relatively low cost of doing business makes it attractive to entrepreneurs, he said.

While Kelly thinks Orlando can aspire to major biomedical cluster status in a decade or so, Dr. John Reed is setting his sights even higher.

Burnham's president and chief executive officer was the keynote speaker last month at an Orlando luncheon to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Florida High Tech Corridor Council.

Reed told the audience of business leaders, politicians and academics, including three university presidents, that San Diego -- with 40 research institutions and 500 biotech companies -- "is a model for what I believe can and will happen in Central Florida."

Reed later explained that, while it had taken San Diego 40 years to reach the biotech stratosphere, "Orlando has the opportunity to do it in a much shorter time frame, maybe 10 to 20 years."

While acknowledging that dozens of other states are working to create their own biomedical clusters, Reed said: "I can tell you -- I don't mean to be derogatory -- but they are hard places to recruit to." Central Florida, he said, offers a California-level "panache factor" but with a more favorable regulatory climate and with a lower cost of living than not only California but South Florida as well.

Some biomedical companies are already taking notice.

Since Burnham's Aug. 23 announcement that it was expanding to Central Florida, the Metro Orlando Economic Development Commission has received eight inquiries from biotech companies interested in setting up shop, reports John Fremstad, the EDC's vice president of technology business development.

Prior to Aug. 23, the EDC had received just three such inquiries in four years, said Fremstad, who also revealed that a new life-science council, tentatively named BiOrlando, was being organized and would launch early this year.

The council's mission, he said, will be to attract and retain the four elements needed for a successful biomedical cluster: research, management talent, biomedical companies and venture capital.

Orlando already has much to offer, he said. It has a nationally recognized cluster for simulation technology and computer science -- both increasingly important components of biomedicine -- and it has two of the country's largest hospital systems in Florida Hospital and Orlando Regional Healthcare.

"We're already strong in health-care delivery and medical training," Fremstad said, and both areas are closely related to biotechnology.

One of the prime movers in Orlando's bid to become a biomedical cluster is Pappachan Kolattukudy, dean of UCF's Burnett College of Biomedical Science. Kolattukudy -- better known as PK -- was recruited to UCF in 2003 from Ohio State University. He hires scientists for his faculty largely based on their ability to win nationally competitive research grants, with annual totals now up to about $8 million.

He expects to hire 30 to 35 more scientists over the next few years, with lab space to accommodate up to 400 researchers. "We will have these biomedical researchers and degree programs that will provide manpower for biomedical clinics," said Kolattukudy, who predicted that within 10 years Central Florida would be "a real player in the biomedical research field."

But he plays down visions of Orlando becoming a top-tier biomedical cluster. "Let's be realistic," he said. "If anybody says we'll be like San Diego, I think that's overly exaggerated."

Even "major player" status may be exaggerated, according to at least one observer of the business.

The biomedical industry is highly concentrated in the top existing clusters, and most growth has been and will be limited to those same clusters, says Joe Cortright, an economist with Impresa Inc. in Portland, Ore., and co-author of a 2002 Brookings Institution study on biomedical clusters.

A biomed cluster "is not like a Krispy Kreme that starts out in one place and grows elsewhere. It grows where it's already established," Cortright said recently.

"The critical factor in this industry is the brilliant scientist who wants to be a businessman. People like that gravitate to the leading areas. I'm not casting aspersions on Orlando or Palm Beach [site of Scripps' East Coast laboratory], but, if you're young and ambitious, you want to be at the epicenter."

While tax dollars may have persuaded Burnham, Scripps and other research institutes to establish beachheads in Florida, inducements like lower housing costs won't work with highly talented, entrepreneurial scientists, said Cortright, who noted that the top U.S. biomedical clusters are also the most expensive housing markets in the country.

The most Orlando can hope for is to be on par with other major metropolitan areas in the country, which have some biomedical research and entrepreneurial activity but do not have biomedical clusters, Cortright said.

Bill Warren, chief executive officer of VaxDesign, the biomedical company that hired Louis Poisson last year, used to share some of Cortright's skepticism. Warren moved his company from Oklahoma to Orlando in 2003 and, after a couple of years, was beginning to wonder if a cluster would ever coalesce.

While he still doubts Orlando will reach the level of a San Diego or Boston, he is increasingly bullish on Orlando's chances of becoming a strong, "second-tier" biomedical cluster.

"To set up a company and its operations is inexpensive here compared with other biotech hubs," Warren said. "We've had venture capitalists come down from Boston -- we tell them our rent, and their jaw hits the floor. They're paying $44 a foot or higher, and the range here is $15 to $18 a foot."

Boston may also have a plethora of great universities, but "UCF has made a big commitment to biotech," Warren said. "It's a lot easier to work with a university that's young and trying to do something than one that's more established."

Warren, who expanded his highly trained, highly educated work force from 20 to 35 people during the past year, said the task of building a biomedical cluster in Central Florida is just beginning.

"Now that we have some momentum, we have to push the rock up the hill. We've gone over a little hill -- now we need to go over a bigger hill."



CONTACT: Harry Wessel can be reached at 407-420-5506 or hwessel@orlandosentinel.com.