According to the Wall Street Journal Online, Eli Lilly is on its way to acquiring ImClone for more than $6 billion USD. To this point, ImClone’s Carl Icahn has simply referred to the potential suitor as a “large pharma company.” The rumored price is $70 per share and ImClone closed today at $65.35 per share.  The offer price is significantly higher than the $62 per share offer from Bristol-Myers, who owns about 15% of ImClone.

Althought the deal is far from done, the combination of the two firms should put ImClone’s projects on stable ground and present many new biotech job opportunities as Lilly positions for a solid return on their investment.

 

The high price of drugs is what fuels the capital flow into biotechs - venture capitalists make big bets and, when a bet does pay off, they need a big return to cover the other losses. High prices for new discoveries is what keeps the returns high. As pricing pressures increase, biotechnology companies look for other ways to reach profitability. The movement to “off shore” biotech jobs to places such as India and China, connects the profitability dots on two fronts.

First, there are straight cost savings to be had. Some of the industry’s largest players (Eli Lilly, Amgen, Merck and others) are seeking a similar mix of low-cost, highly educated labor that made the tech sectore move to India in a big way several years ago. Second, the business has shifted and the heat is on to come up with market changing products that will drive desperately needed revenue growth. In addition to gobbling up smaller, successful biotechs, setting up overseas partnerships for collaborative research is another strategy to plugging the gap that expiring patents leave behind.

US biopharma companies are moving research jobs off shore and we don’t expect the trend to slow anytime soon.

 

Amid Obama’s threats of no tax breaks for companies who send jobs overseas, the states are battling it out here at home for the fight for biotech jobs.

Governor Schwarzenegger followed up from his June promise to the biotech industry to fight for the industry in the California budget negotiations. In a year when the state needs all the tax revenue it can get to fix a severe budget problem, the industry got that promised lift in research and development tax credits and a program that allows companies to carry forward net operating losses until later when they show profit on the bottom line.

But California lost a biotech company this week when Sequenom (San Diego) announced it is expanding in Grand Rapids, Michigan. With the help of the Michigan Economic Growth Authority (yes, MEGA), a $20 million diagnostic testing technology center will be built. The move will bring 500 much needed jobs to a state which continues to ache from a weak auto industry.

Massachusetts is projecting a gain of about 11,000 new life science jobs in the next 5 years. This is partially the result of Governor Deval Patrick’s $1 billion Life Sciences Initiative. But players in MA will have to content with the folks down South. BioRegion News spoke this week with Stacy Williams Shuker about her new position in the Georgia life sciences incubator program aimed at life science start ups.

All of these programs are great in terms of encouraging young biotech companies to set up shop in business friendly environments. There may be a more fundamental problem that could keep the jobs from materializing – capital.

Biotech companies have always been hungry for cash and the current financial markets environment create two forms of pressure. First, there is less liquidity in the market (less cash to invest). Second, the IPO market (a VC’s ultimate exit plan) is weak. So, convincing investors to part with their cash for the potential of a big IPO has become a bigger challenge.

Who knows, maybe McCain and Obama have a plan for that too?