Experts gathered at the Advanced Therapies Integrates 2021 conference recently to debate solutions to challenges facing the sector. Here they focus on how to develop the tech talent needed to build the next generation of vital products.
The event was chaired by James Strachan, editor of The Cell and Gene Curator newsletter, who kicked off the discussion by asking the panellists their experiences of the skills gap.
He began with a question for the advanced therapies sector: “Do we have the right skills and capabilities in place to identify and develop the next generation of advanced therapy medicinal products?”
Nick Stephens, executive chairman of the RSA Group: “The short answer is, it’s big. And the longer answer is, it’s going to get bigger. And there are a number of factors that have come into this,
“The one that’s thrown everything into light is the pandemic and manufacture of vaccines – you don’t get a bigger market than the whole world. Every single CDMO (contract development and manufacturing organisation) you talk to in this space is flat out at the moment.
“Now, that’s going to have real issues, because demand is going to go up. And that increasing demand has been anticipated by the private equity part of the market. So private equity is very, very aggressively investing in capacity and space. All of that drives demand for people.
“We see huge demand for chairs, who can negotiate this world, for CEOs doing repeat plays, and for CMOs, who’ve done this before.
“Probably the only unique thing at the moment is the digital piece, chief data officers; the complexities of supply chain through to the clinic for therapeutics mean that data is more critical than in any other branch of the life sciences right now.”
Charlotte Casebourne, chief executive officer and co-founder of Theolytics and board member of the UK BioIndustry Association (BIA): “Working with the BIA over the last year has been a real eye opener, and I think this is a significant problem which is only going to get bigger. We’re looking at over 130,000 more jobs in our industry in the UK by 2030. To put that into context, that is roles within bio manufacturing literally doubling in total number in the next three years.
“I’m very much with Nick; manufacturing is a really important part of this, as is the translational cross functional leadership, especially with all that private equity coming into the country.
“And the companies that are already here are increasing in size and complexity, so all this is what the BIA is looking at at the moment.”
James: “On the manufacturing side, what’s the overall picture that you’re seeing as part of a catapult Stephen?”
Stephen Ward, chief manufacturing officer at Cell and Gene Therapy Catapult: “We performed a survey in 2019 to determine what the predicted growth looked like across the space, including R&D, food, commercial, clinical, and obviously manufacturing. From the 122 companies that we spoke to, there’s big growth predicted in the companies that are already in the UK.
“From a headwind point of view, about 3,500 people are employed within the sector. And that predicted to be going up to 10,000 by 2026.
“The question for the UK is how do we use this as an advantage rather than a hindrance? I think there’s a great opportunity here, because skills are a shortage globally, to make this a positive, and a driver for growth, rather than just trying to solve a problem.”
James: “Chris, maybe you could give us an outsider perspective, as ONK isn’t fully based in the UK.”
Chris Nowers, chief executive officer, ONK Therapeutics: “We’re a cell therapy company based in Galway, in Ireland, and in San Diego, in California.
“I think that the UK is pretty fortunate and there are some really healthy cell therapy community initiatives there. And that’s not by chance, it’s by design. There are real engines of activity that are not only developing the cell therapy community, but also the associated talent pool.
“So if you have a good strong foundational community, then you have the opportunity to grow that community.
“To throw in a couple of perspectives from Galway in Ireland and San Diego; Galway is one of the medtech capitals of the world, but it does have a very modest cell therapy community.
“In order to meet what is a pretty ambitious and rapid expansion, we turned to the US and San Diego in particular, for a very strong reason – the city is fast becoming a hub for NK (natural killer) cell therapy companies, so we figured we should be where our peer group is.
“I think wherever one is, the competition for key hires is very strong, and something that is key is the company offering – the potential of the company, and the company culture is almost a prerequisite to attract the top talent.”
James: “Stephen, it might be nice to if you could talk about the some of the initiatives that are already in place in the UK.”
Stephen: “We’ve kicked this off with an apprenticeship community, which from a standing start has been a huge success. We’ve now got over 200 apprentices on the programme for about 40 companies.
“And this is a programme to ensure that companies are getting what they need and it’s been really successful for them but importantly for the people who go onto it.
“Based on that we secured £5m funding from Bayes through the pandemic to not only carry on with the apprenticeship programme but also to start a new initiative to set up a national network of Advanced Therapy Skills and Training Centres.
“The philosophy there is, we very much see all of our skills work as a partnership with industry; if you’re not doing what industry wants and needs, it’s just vainglorious activity.
“The second principle is that we have a lot of skills in the UK – how do we leverage those? So, we have three centres, which have kicked off the programme. Roslin Cells Sciences is coordinating the Scottish consortium, the National Horizon Centre in Darlington is doing really good work around larger scale processing, and then University of Birmingham is doing more of the specialized cell therapy work.
“A thread running through all three is the utilisation of virtual reality training, using these platforms not only to speed up training, but to get right-first-time outcomes.
“We’re also trying to attract more people into the industry, looking to match people’s existing skills against what the opportunities are in the UK, because other transferable skills that you can get from associated industries, processing industries, technical backgrounds, are very well aligned.”
James: “Charlotte could you give your perspective, from the BIA point of view, on some of the newer initiatives to close the skills gap?”
Charlotte: “Thinking forward, all the way back to the very start of people coming into our sector, that’s through education. We’re starting to collaborate with outreach organisations that are doing great work in engaging people at school level and helping them understand exactly what career paths are available.
“I think from a policy perspective, one of the things that the BIA is working very hard on is bringing people in internationally to the UK. Visa paths and routes have been a big area of focus over the last two years with Brexit, and a lot of those pathways have changed significantly.
“With my Theolytics hat on, that’s been transformative for our company; the percentage of our team that were not UK based when we hired them is probably more than 50 per cent.
“Also, we are more and more hiring for potential and not necessarily for experience, investing a lot of time to upskill people when they’re with us.”
James: “Nick, what else can individual companies do to solve their own talent gaps?”
Nick: “Let’s start with retention. You know, the easiest way not to have gaps in your organisation is to have people want to work in it, and that is something that we can all manage to an extent.
“You can’t keep everybody happy, you can’t provide everybody with opportunities, but in an organisation that’s growing, there are more chances for people to progress.
“So number one, you can reduce your problem by reducing your turnover.
“There are real opportunities in the UK, to go out to the regions, to places where there is less employment, and bring people through, so we need to think about a regional strategy in the UK.
“Also, we can prioritise our international acceptance of people. We do accept expertise, wisdom from other places, and we speak the universal language, so we have opportunity to bring people in – all we need is policy aligned with need.”
Chris: “Another point I would make is, yes, you can bring people to the company. But I think companies can be very flexible from a geographic perspective. One thing we’ve learned through Covid is that you don’t all have to be in the same location.
“And the last thing I would say is, you’ve got to keep a bench. When you have that inpour of resumes, we’re very keen to keep our bench so that when we need more hires, or if unfortunately, we have to replace people, we’ve got a good bench to turn to.”
James: “A question from the audience: what should we as a country do that we’re not currently doing to solve this problem?”
Nick: “The way we do that is hire for attitude and train for skill, make sure the training is there, make sure the opportunities are there, make sure that all of the communication is consistent.
“If the pandemic has proved anything, it’s that we no longer need to be at work to work, what we need to do is to feel part of an organisation. So you organise your business not around a place, you organise it around a group of people and purpose.”
Charlotte: “We are a part of a global industry, and the therapies and diagnostics that we’re trying to develop are to serve a global community.
“To stay competitive and continue at the level that the UK does, it does need to continue to be a government priority. It does need to continue to be a government priority.”
Chris: “Having worked in the UK, I think there’s some really tremendous, really strong mechanisms to take science out of academic centres, and put them into fledgling companies, and to have them go through that initial growth.
“One of my frustrations is that there are many, many companies that get from small to medium, and then, primarily chasing funding, they go off to the US. So if there were an opportunity to revitalise the UK investment market, I think that would be something tremendous.”
Stephen: “if the UK wants this to be a foundational to the economy going forward, it needs to be ingrained right from school, and not just in the early R&D, which is we’ve focused on a lot, but also into the advanced manufacturing elements, and then the advanced supply chain.
“We relied on the UK’s bio ecosystem during the pandemic, and what an example of what can be done with collective mindset in terms of the vaccine development and supply, and we need to build on that.”
Charlotte: “We need that integration between not only our academic centres, our companies in the corporate environment, but also the NHS and our health care system and some of the incredible work that’s going on there.
“The other thing to hold in all of our minds is the impact of Brexit on the MHRA, which is another organisation that we’re all incredibly proud of, making sure that we’re lobbying and continuing to ensure that it is supported and is backed by the government.”
James: “So how positive are you all? Is this a problem that can be solved?”
Nick: “Of course the problem can be solved, we’ve identified the component parts of it.
“Imagine the NHS getting early access to advanced therapeutics at a discounted cost, because they’ve been involved in clinical trials.
“Imagine schools and universities, where kids are grown up through the pandemic, never wanting to be locked in their bedrooms again, wanting to do something secure
“Imagine a place where current therapies that are either taken for a lifetime can be replaced by a single dose, and people will be healthier for the rest of their lives.
“Imagine being the cornerstone of that.
“We’ve got all of the ingredients we need, we need the intent, and the decision making. And then we need the execution.”
This debate took place at the Advanced Therapies Integrates 2021 conference. See more here.
