EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES | BDO LLP
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31 EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES | BDO LLP
BIOTECH
creating intense spikes and swings in all sorts of areas. One area that has experienced intense volatility is BioTech, as companies involved in testing and vaccine development report on new developments and potential advances. Stock in Genedrive, for example, enjoyed an extraordinary 280% price gain on the London Stock Exchange in one day in late March 2020, at a point when the company was embarking on coronavirus test production. There’s no doubt that BioTech businesses related to virus research, therapies and testing will continue to attract funding and investor interest. ‘Right now, the big question is which biotech can provide the pandemic solution the quickest, writes Carlos de Rojas for Labiotech. eu. ‘Some companies, focused on the making and testing of COVID-19 test kits, are expected to play a critical role in managing the outbreak, and have consequently gained a lot of value.
some early promise as a treatment for the virus – reached a total equity of $22.65 billion in 2019. Australia-based CSL is a global BioTech specialist that researches, develops, manufactures and markets influenza vaccines and other treatments for serious medical conditions. CSL’s annual profit rose by 11% in 2019 to $1.9 billion. THE GLOBAL BIOTECHNOLOGY MARKET SIZE IS EXPECTED TO REACH $727.1 BILLION BY 2025 , WITH A COMPOUND GROWTH RATE OF OVER 7% .
SCOPE AND DEFINITION Biotechnology typically involves the use of living organisms to develop chemicals and other products, or perform an industrial task. BioTech is most commonly used in agriculture, food science and medicine. Key areas, as classified by Grand View Research , include regenerative medicine; genetics in diagnostics; fermentation; nanobiotechnology; food and agriculture; industrial processing; natural resources and environment; and bioinformatics.
NAMES AND NUMBERS The global biotechnology market size is expected to reach $727.1 billion by 2025 , with a compound growth rate of over 7%. The UK biotechnology sector was worth £1.3 billion in 2019 . The world’s leading BioTech companies include Roche Holding AG, the Swiss multinational healthcare company that works both in pharmaceuticals and diagnostics. Its company assets were valued at $85.8 billion in 2019. Amgen, established in California in 1980, uses BioTech to develop and manufacture new medicines for patients with serious illnesses. The company was valued at $77.6 billion in 2016. Gilead Sciences, a US biopharmaceutical company focused primarily on the development of anti-viral drugs used to treat HIV, hepatitis B, hepatitis C and influenzas – perhaps best-known now for its drug remdesivir, which showed
CORONAVIRUS AND BEYOND The highest-ranked BioTech company in the 2019 Tech Track 100 , Oxford Nanopore Technologies, was spun out of Oxford University in 2005. With revenues at £32.5 million in 2018, the company secured £451m in funding from investors and was valued at £1.5bn. The company specialises in compact DNA/RNA sequencing technology for biological research, and has developed devices to help scientists identify bacteria and viruses, track disease outbreaks and study the DNA of humans, animals and plants. One of many tech companies doing their bit in the pandemic, the company provided its suite of sequencing products to countries worldwide, to help with research into the genetic epidemiology of the virus. COVID-19 has wreaked havoc on the stock markets, causing many once reliable sectors to tank and
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