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As we head towards the cooler weather, shorter days and bombardment of Autumn conferences, the annual BIO 2001 meeting in San Diego in June may seem like a long time ago. However, the memory of a marathon BIO with over 13,000 participants from all over the world, 700 exhibitors, 230 presenting companies and 15 conference tracks will probably stay with most of us for a long time to come. The sheer scale of the meeting and the buzz in the conference halls (and queues) reflected just how much the industry continues to grow and evolve in the post-2000 financing bonanza. Though times are now much tougher - with talk of recession on either side of the Atlantic, concern over the lack of leadership at the FDA, safety concerns, product withdrawals and manufacturing capacity problems (not forgetting the President Bush/stemcell/federal funding debate) - its not all doom and gloom for biotech. Many companies raised significant funds in the US and Europe last year and are now actively employing them in bringing products through development and negotiating higher value alliance deals with larger pharma partners. The pace of advance in science is also compelling and the blend of genomics, proteomics, informaticsand high throughput technologies is beginning to mature into new product development strategies.
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