Cytotoxic Success: Outsourcing R&D

By Dr. Laura Ciccolini

Partnering with a specialist CRO is an ideal way to quickly and cost-effectively manage development.

Biopharmaceutical manufacturing is increasingly focused on productivity & efficiency. A changing economic climate together with the patent cliff of many major products has resulted in drastic changes in the business models of a whole industry. It’s no longer simply the repetitive, simple tasks that are outsourced, but increasingly complex specialized tasks including research and development, when pursuing the identification of new chemical and biochemical entities.

Small biotech’s embrace outsourcing as their strategy is not to gain the capital for large, expensive development departments but rather focus on their specialty and achieve success with collaborators. Large pharmaceutical manufacturers downsized many departments but in-house R&D persists, often this being still seen as a “core” to maintain, yet they seek external expertise as support. Overall, for all scales and configurations of organization there are tangible benefits to outsourcing research and development work.