Essay by Olivier Russo, Executive Director, Global Head of CMC – Research & Development, Servier
Biological medicines account for nearly 60% of treatments in development worldwide1. Yet in France, we produce barely 10% of those produced in Europe2.
Given this observation, I participated in the “Matinale des nouveaux acteurs des biotherapies”. As a founding member of the France BioLead alliance, it was an opportunity to discuss the major challenges we face with other stakeholders, biotech companies and public authorities in particular. Today more than ever, there are many interconnected challenges for the bioproduction sector in France and in Europe more broadly.
Expert talent: essential components to sustainably develop the bioproduction sector
Given that the sector is currently rapidly expanding, it makes sense that there are fewer experts available in relation to the needs of companies in the sector. And although France has assets to attract candidates, the battle for talents is decidedly global.
Beyond building up this sector, which will take time, our first challenge is to meet our imminent needs, particularly in terms of the skills sought. To do this, we have implemented several strategies.
The first is to capitalize on the skills available internally. In addition to their high level of expertise and training, one of the unique features that characterizes Servier employees is their loyalty and we are well aware what a strength this is! That is why we decided to capitalize on their knowledge, by offering reconversion or training in bioproduction jobs to those who wish to participate. In this way, we ensure that a virtuous circle of internal training is implemented, which will benefit other employees or future employees in the long term through the transmission of knowledge, and we also contribute to a culture of offering meaningful career paths in line with the Group’s evolution.
We can also rely on the digital campus Immerscio.bio, a platform dedicated to bioproduction. It allows us to offer Servier employees, as well as everyone wishing to train for jobs in bioproduction, online training, which complements the conventional training available in institutes, for example. It is a hybrid solution that integrates perfectly with the daily lives of those involved, at all stages of their career.
Next, we are convinced that by helping to raise awareness of the sector and the jobs that make it up, we will encourage people to take up vocations. We must be an ambassador for young people in order to attract future talents to train in the jobs of the sector. For this purpose, for example, we work with training organizations, such as bio3, to develop attractive programs. This obviously involves presenting our jobs in schools and creating tailor-made courses, but also our support for the French National Bioproduction Day, which was celebrated for the first time on July 5 of this year.
Finally, it is clear that Servier is not (yet 😊) a recognized player in this field today and that is understandable! To attract candidates, we must therefore distinguish ourselves from other companies engaged in the production of biological medicines in the territory. And we do not lack assets: We can rely on our unique governance through a foundation, our integrated research, our industrial capabilities and, of course, the meaningful work we offer. These are the real reasons we are attractive to candidates, who all highlight the uniqueness of our company and the commitment of its employees.
Even as today’s needs are met, we must anticipate future needs. It is a sector in constant evolution. We must anticipate the skills that will be essential in the coming years by collaborating with training organizations now, in order to ensure that the training offered by higher education organizations (Supbiotech, Agroparistech, INSA, ESILV, ESTBB, EBI or the Bio3 in Tours) meets the needs of French industry.
It should also be noted that the profiles we will be looking for in the coming years are not exclusively biotechnological. We need to anticipate the skills we will need across the entire biological medicine value chain going forward, as well as in the maintenance of our bioproduction units and sterile units and the need for automation engineers.
Recruitment challenges are obviously crucial to starting activity. However, they are not the only issues we need to address to build a sector of excellence. I suggest that we come back to these other points next week.
Yet having the right talents will solve only part of the problem because the bioproduction sector has many interconnected challenges.
The issues are diverse. We must tackle them in a synchronized way in order to build solid foundations for a sector of excellence
I also believe that we need to concentrate our efforts on two points.
The first concerns investments, which must be made throughout the value chain. Indeed, if we want to increase the percentage of biological medicines produced in France, we must do everything necessary to ensure the development of the biological medicine from A to Z, that is to say, the technical, pharmaceutical and industrial development stages, to fuel clinical trials and then ensure commercial launches.
At Servier, biologics represent nearly 50% of our R&D projects in the fields of oncology, neurology and autoimmune diseases.
It was therefore essential to invest in modern infrastructure to enable us to put our strategic choices into action. For our part, we have chosen a European R&D value chain for our bioproduction activities. Accordingly, we have a center dedicated to biological medicine discovery and development in Denmark, as well as a biological medicine production unit, BioS, in France at our site in Gidy. This unit, the result of an investment of nearly 85 million euros, will be inaugurated in November 2024. It is intended for the manufacture of the Group’s experimental biological and sterile medicines. These investments are on top of investments of more than 40 million euros for the extension of our R&D building, which will allow all our pharmaceutical development, bioproduction and clinical batch manufacturing activities to be located together on the Gidy site.
Our ambitions in the production of biological medicines are clearly in line with our capacity as a medium-sized player: The challenge for us is to reach the critical size to support our portfolio of R&D projects, featuring some sixty products in total, or around thirty biotherapies.
Next, and not least, we absolutely need to support and strengthen the industrial fabric to offer start-ups in this field an environment conducive to innovation and partnerships.
We sometimes forget this, but the development of a sector also requires the creation of the innovation ecosystem that supports it. This involves financial support (risk capital or investment funds), opportunities for public-private partnerships, and regulations that encourage initiatives and risk-taking.
The emergence of start-ups and specialized companies is a positive and strong signal of the value of the sector.
They will also cover needs that we cannot necessarily cover. As a mid-size and therefore focused player, we also absolutely need to rely on their expertise, as well as on academic collaborations, to generate new innovative therapeutic projects, as well as to develop more robust and efficient manufacturing processes since we do not always have end-to-end capabilities in these processes.
Our contribution to the ecosystem is also reflected in our membership in the various organizations that aim to strengthen the sector, in particular PolePharma and Medicen. We also provide financial support through Bpifrance’s InnoBio2 fund and the Kurma3 fund, both of which invest in biotechnology start-ups.
We have currently managed to cover the 65 positions created in bioproduction to start activities in our new BioS building. This proves that the mobilization of all stakeholders and the holistic approach that we have deployed together to optimize skills and expertise in the sector are beginning to bear fruit. These are the beginnings of a virtuous circle where everyone has a role to play. Because if everyone irrigates the ecosystem with whatever contribution they can, the foundations on which we build the sector will be all the more solid to ensure its success!
[1] France 2030 : Point d’étape après deux ans d’actions menées par la stratégie française en « Biothérapie et Bioproduction de Thérapies innovantes » – Presse – Ministère des Finances [Progress report after two years of actions carried out by the French strategy in “Biotherapy and Bioproduction of Innovative Therapies”] / https://presse.economie.gouv.fr/france-2030-point-detape-apres-deux-ans-dactions-menees-par-la-strategie-francaise-en-biotherapie-et-bioproduction-de-therapies-innovantes/
[2] La place de la France dans la production de médicaments [The role of France in drug production] | Leem / https://www.leem.org/la-place-de-la-france-dans-la-production-de-medicaments