Speech by President Tony Tan at Biopolis 10th Anniversary Gala Dinner

Excellencies

Mr Lim Chuan Poh
Chairman, A*STAR

Mr Leo Yip
Chairman, EDB

Dr Loo Choon Yong
Chairman, JTC Corporation

Distinguished Guests

Ladies and Gentlemen

        Good evening. It is indeed a great pleasure for me to be here tonight and be part of tonight’s celebration of the 10^th anniversary of Biopolis, Singapore’s hub for Biomedical Sciences (BMS) research and development.

        Biopolis was conceived as a campus that would support and foster a span of research activities across BMS disciplines, and catalyse partnerships with corporate laboratories to take ideas from the bench to healthcare and industry development. Beginning with seven buildings in Phase 1 of its development in 2003, Biopolis is today in Phase 5 of its development with 13 buildings and 340,000 square meters of space. Today, there are 40 companies in Biopolis and more companies are planning to co-locate in its premises. There is a mix of over 2,500 public and private sector researchers from a diverse international community of over 70 nationalities. Biopolis is a conducive and vibrant “work, live, play and learn” research hub.

        This unique environment generates opportunities for interaction and communication among public and private sector researchers, and we have seen many successful collaborations. One example is the Novartis Institute for Tropical Diseases (NITD) which was the first pharma company to locate in Biopolis in 2004. Over the years, NITD has collaborated with A*STAR institutes such as the Genome Institute of Singapore, the Singapore Immunology Network and the Experimental Therapeutics Centre. Working with the Singapore Immunology Network and Tan Tock Seng Hospital, NITD is now developing a potential dengue vaccine that can target all four serotypes of the dengue virus.  

        Besides pharma companies, biologics and medical technology companies such as Abbott and Panasonic Health have also set up corporate labs in Biopolis. Chugai, a Japanese biologics company, officially opened a new $200 million antibody engineering research centre in July 2012, their second research centre in Biopolis. Besides multi-national companies, Singapore has produced a number of biomedical SMEs and start-ups including AIT Biotech, Curiox, HistoIndex, and Veredus Labs which have launched innovative medical products and have penetrated regional or global markets.

        BMS research is also expanding beyond traditional pharma and biologics activities into food and nutrition, and personal care. Danone, L’Oreal and Procter & Gamble have established research centres in Singapore. These companies are increasingly relying on BMS research in order to develop products that are better suited to the markets in Asia.  For example, Procter & Gamble’s (P&G) Singapore Innovation Centre in Biopolis, when fully established, will be the largest private sector tenant with 500 people. P&G made the strategic decision to locate its innovation centre in Biopolis because of the proximity to public sector researchers in Biopolis and Fusionopolis, and to leverage on the Asian phenotype in Singapore which would encourage innovations and facilitate the development of new consumer products for the burgeoning Asian markets.

        We have witnessed remarkable growth of the BMS sector in Singapore over the past decade. Its manufacturing output has increased by nearly five times from $6 billion to $29.4 billion in 2012. The BMS industry is today the largest contributor to our manufacturing sector in terms of value-added in 2012, contributing more than a quarter of total manufacturing value-added. Employment in the BMS industry has also grown by 2.5 times, from 6,000 in 2000 to 15,700 in 2012. Singapore is today a leading manufacturing location for pharmaceuticals and biologics as well as various medical technology products, ranging from life science tools to medical devices.

        Besides the infrastructure development of Biopolis as a hub for world-class R&D, talent is one of the key drivers in the BMS initiative. The BMS research community, made up of both the public and private sectors, has doubled in the last 10 years from 2,150 in 2002 to over 5,000 in 2011. More than 1,200 A*STAR scholars have been trained in biomedical as well as physical sciences and engineering and I am happy to note that a number of young Singaporean scientists are now leading their own research programmes in the A*STAR research institutes and in our universities. Singapore scientists have published consistently in leading journals such as Nature, Science and Cell over the last 10 years. Besides Biopolis, the Outram Campus has the Academia hub, NUS has the MD6 building for basic and translational research, and NTU will soon establish the Lee Kong Chian Medical School in Novena. Our ecosystem has become more diverse and vibrant, bringing discovery through the translational and clinical space much sooner.

        Some of you may remember that the groundbreaking ceremony of the Biopolis in December 2001 took place when Singapore was experiencing one of her worst economic recessions then. The success of Biopolis and the BMS sector today is symbolic of Singapore’s commitment to anchor BMS as the fourth pillar of Singapore’s economic strategy to broaden and diversify our economic base by cultivating new knowledge-based industry clusters. The fact that we achieved all this in the space of 10 years could not have happened without the close cooperation of A*STAR, EDB and JTC, with strong support from the Ministry of Trade & Industry, Ministry of Health, the National Research Foundation, many other agencies, and many of the people here tonight, especially Mr Philip Yeo, the first Chairman of A*STAR.

        I congratulate all of you on the 10^th anniversary of Biopolis, and I wish Biopolis and our Biomedical Sciences sector many more years of success. 

        Thank you.