SA, Germany in biotech start-up pact

Bio Innovation South Australia has a special offer for Australian biotech companies eying the lucrative European market: set up in SA, and take a free one-month working holiday to Germany to court potential business and research partners and clients.

Bio Innovation SA's CEO, Dr Jurgen Michaelis, has set up a buddy arrangement with compatriot Dr Klaus Ullrich, MD of German biotech incubator BioCentiv, in Jena, in Thuringia Free State.

Under their cooperation agreement, established and emerging biotech companies from South Australia or Germany will be able to work for up to a month at a time in the other's country to establish linkages, research collaborations and business partnerships.

Michaelis said the new agreement was part of Bio Innovation SA's strategy of helping South Australia's biotech companies to develop professional contacts and business linkages with overseas companies based in the world's most successful bioincubator facilities.

Michaelis and Ullrich discussed the possible SA-Thuringia link at last year's BIO Conference in Washington, and sealed the deal when Ullrich came to Australia for last year's AusBiotech conference in Adelaide.

"Klaus is running one of the most successful biotech incubators in Europe," Michaelis said. "I believe these things work best through personal contact. You need to have someone on the ground, because business is best done face to face.

"It a SA biotech company wants to establish linkages in Europe, they can contact Bio Innovation, and I'll contact Klaus at BioCentiv in Germany and discuss the company's bona fides.

"After Klaus gives the company the tick, he'll offer them free office space, and his free consultancy advice, and his contacts, to help them link into the European biotech community. We're offering a similar deal to German companies wanting to establish research or business linkages in Australia.

"We're linking into a region that is similar to Adelaide, and our biotech activities are very complementary -- BioCentiv in Jena is very strong in biomedical and bioscience instrumentation, while we have strengths in biomedical and agricultural research."

German companies exploiting the reciprocal offer may operate from the new $9 million bioscience incubator announced this week by the SA government.

The SA government is describing the 3000 square metre complex at the Thebarton Bioscience Precinct as Australia's first dedicated bioscience incubator, and expects it to create hundreds of jobs in the bioscience industries over the next decade.

Infant bioscience companies will be able to lease modular office and laboratory space in the complex. A team of commercial bioscience business mentors from Bio Innovation SA will be located in the complex to provide companies with advice and hands-on support.

Michaelis said he believed the incubator would provide a huge competitive advantage to South Australia's bioscience sector, attracting venture capital investment and encouraging bioscience companies from other states to relocate to South Australia.

"Globally, incubator facilities such as this are the catalyst in creating a bioscience industry," he said. "All the successful bioscience clusters worldwide have specialised incubators."