China's biotech industry: An Asian dragon is growing

Long viewed as an artful copier but certainly no innovator, China's foray into the knowledge industries (Biotech here) is inevitable if it is to sustain the roaring growth of its economy. The government has decided to pump money into this ascendant area. Official funding can only go so far though: private venture capital is needed to sustain the long-term growth of the industry. VCs are wary of investing owing to an uncertain financial climate and limited exit strategies.

Notably, the twin Asian giants, China and India, have different strategies regarding biotech: India's efforts are largely on process innovation to improve affordability of existing products while China is gunning for big new products. Both are equally important and laudable and it will be interesting to see which strategy proves to be more successful.

It will also be interesting to see how Chinese scientists might leverage on their vast heritage of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) therapies and use western-style science to legitimize TCM in the international therapy scene, where it is still viewed as pseudo-medicine. Increasingly already, I see many papers on Pubmed on the biochemical mechanisms through which various chinese herbal medicines work on curing diseases. (An example here). The approach works well : Chinese medicine loses its mystical aura and gains from a rational, systematic approach that is verifiable, and the world gains from a vast array of ancient medical knowledge.

The article also discussed returning "sea turtles": Chinese scientists and entrepreneurs trained overseas who return home with scientific talent and international credibility. ("Whales" anyone?) This "reverse brain-drain" was also important for Taiwan's huge dominance in the electronics industry. Might we see the same thing here? Taiwan has had the benefit of an exuberantly democratic political climate though - will China's repressive policies prove to be a stumbling block?

The original Eurekalert article here.