Vancouver’s life sciences scene dates to the first biotech boom in the early 1980s. Toronto and Montreal also produced biotechs, but Vancouver had several advantages, such as risk-tolerant investors and the city’s natural beauty
Carl Hansen stands atop one of the five buildings his antibody development company, AbCellera Biologics Inc., occupies in Vancouver’s Mount Pleasant neighbourhood, taking in the view. He’s not looking at the mountains in the distance on this overcast day, but a teeming construction site right across the street.
Now a group of bold companies led by AbCellera are determined to shock the local ecosystem back to life, even if they must lay the bricks themselves. They are bent on establishing Vancouver, and in turn Canada, as a major player in the US$1.5-trillion pharmaceutical industry, spurning our long-standing reputation as a country of top-notch medical researchers whose breakthroughs get commercialized elsewhere.
“Perhaps the dream of creating a sustainable and strong biotech industry in Canada is unrealistic,” Julia Levy, former CEO of now defunct QLT, lamented in her 2020 autobiography.Abi Coman-Walker beams with house pride as she gives a tour of Acuitas Therapeutics Inc.’s new office on the University of British Columbia campus.
By February, 2020, AbCellera had obtained the blood sample of a recovered COVID-19 patient. Using its platform, which combines protein engineering, microfluidics and artificial intelligence, AbCellera quickly discovered an antibody capable of treating patients. By December, the company and partner Eli Lilly had regulatory clearance to market the drug, bamlanivimab, and AbCellera raisedand net profits of US$431-million from 2020 through 2022. Now it is out to prove its pandemic hit was no fluke.
The biggest of all, Stemcell Technologies Canada Inc., produces media and tools used to discover drugs. The industry supplier has 2,500 employees, made $523-million in revenue in 2023, and has bought two companies in 2024. When 83-year old CEO and founder Allen Eaves, who has never raised equity financing, is
Vancouver’s life sciences scene dates to the first biotech boom in the early 1980s. UBC had the key ingredient: entrepreneurial academics inspired by the breakout success of San Francisco’s genetic engineering pioneer Genentech, which went public in 1980 and created blockbuster treatments ranging from growth hormones to breast cancer drug Herceptin. Those included Dr. Levy and her QLT co-founders, Dr. Cullis, future Nobel Prize winner Michael Smith and Michael Hayden, a co-founder of Xenon.
Dr. Madden, a Brit who had multiple fellowship offers, visited in mid-1980 “I thought, ‘Oh my god, it’s a paradise,’” he says. He chose UBC, studied under Dr. Cullis and they launched several companies.Dr. Hansen moved here because his Vancouver-born wife wanted to come home. Researchers at UBC spinout ImmGenics Pharmaceuticals Inc.
UBC’s leaders embraced the school’s reputation for translating medical discoveries into businesses, including David Strangway, president from 1985 to 1997, and successor Martha Piper, who pushed the Chrétien government to direct substantial research and innovation funds to universities after vanquishing the deficit. Ottawa responded with an innovation-funding body to help universities construct labs and buildings.
Dr. Siriam Subramaniam, the founder and CEO of Gandeeva Therapeutics Inc., examines 3D models of biological structures at his Vancouver office. Other UBC academics who have eschewed the commercial realm are coming around. That includes Megan Levings, a childhood disease researcher at the BC Children’s Hospital Research Institute and faculty member at Dr. Zandstra’s school. Patenting discoveries wasn’t on her radar when she arrived in 2003. Now “it’s part of our academic mandate,” she says.Dr. Megan Levings in her office at the B.C. Children’s Hospital Research Institute in Vancouver. Dr.
All those flights “have been good for my Aeroplan,” he says drily. “If I had thought about it earlier I would have staked a claim. I thought, ‘Next time I do this, I’ll be smart.’” Real estate is a roadblock for many Vancouver biotechs. There is basically no move-in ready lab space – which costs more to build than other commercial real estate because floors must accommodate heavy loads and ceilings need to be tall for equipment and ventilation.plan to build 2.
Abdera’s later stage development and clinical trials will happen in the U.S. “given the amount of talent there to recruit from,” Ms. Janes says. Abdera even officially moved in 2023, reincorporating in Delaware.
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