By Ng Wee Pin, Research Analyst, Healthcare

Overview

Taiwan has a small area of land, small population numbers and limited natural resources. For the past 20 years, although Taiwan has seen high economic growth, the pressure from developing countries is currently threatening Taiwan’s position in the Asia Pacific economy. It is obvious that depending on traditional production technologies will not be wise, so there is a need to remodel the economy to one that is high technology based.

However, due to the fast economic growth in the past, the natural environment and social welfare have deteriorated rapidly. The overall quality of life has not increased in proportion with the economic growth, but has hit rock-bottom, widening the gap between the haves and the have-nots. In order to remodel and further develop the economy and at the same time promote quality of life, biotechnology is seen as the best option. As such, Taiwan government has listed biotechnology as one of the 8 key technologies of development as early as 1982.

Changes in the past

Traditional biotechnology involves the techniques in agriculture, husbandry and food processing. Modern biotechnology uses high productivity of microorganisms to improve fermentation, industrial scale production of antibiotics, organic acids, amino acids, enzymes, etc. The "new age" biotechnology uses gene cloning, protein engineering, tissue culture and other techniques, to discover new drugs, improve crops, etc.

Chart 1-1 shows the life cycle of biotechnology, and the stage where Taiwan is currently at with the corresponding technologies. It is estimated that Taiwanese market is at the late stage of the growth phase, preparing to move into mature stage.

Several technologies are already available in the Taiwanese industry as indicated in the chart above. It maybe noteworthy to mention that at the current stage, the market has already established strong foundation in biochip and biosensor technology.

Along the process, 6 key biotechnology techniques have evolved:

• Genetic engineering
• Cell fusion technology
• Bioreaction technology
• Cell culture technology
• Tissue culture technology
• Embryo / nucleus transplantation technology

The drivers and restraints of Taiwan biotechnology

Towards the future

It has arrived to a point that Taiwan needs to re-position itself in the biotechnology market to seek its own "brand" at the international level, in order to maintain or even increase its competitiveness.

While every other country is moving towards globalization, so should the technology developed within Taiwan. Similarly, the industry players should not be bound by the domestic market, and should strive to establish recognition of brand globally to achieve the competitive advantage.

At the same time, in order to compete with larger overseas market players, it might be necessary for local players to look at the existing relationship with local potential partners. Mergers, acquisition and strategic partnership will allow specialization of the marketing strength, thus reducing risk while increasing profit.

This article originates from Frost and Sullivan

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