Goodbye, Blue Sky: Shortcutting Discovery

A handful of European biotechnology companies is embracing development shortcuts that were once the exclusive provenance of specialty pharmaceutical firms. Shedding traditional biotech start-up discovery models, these firms aim to identify, reformulate and incrementally improve existing products. The hope is that low risk needn't be low reward; in the process these so-called reprofilers of existing therapies may indeed spark an increase in industry productivity. The trick, observers say, is finding and getting their hands on the right products.

By late 1990s standards, the model isn't very sexy. But then again, tastes change.

The genomics and proteomics platforms and discovery engines of the turn of the century have been dismissed as unprofitable "blue...

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