Government-funded programs, such as the National Genome Research Network, are boosting biotechnology. The network supports new biotech R&D companies, young scientists, cooperative efforts between science and industry, biological safety research, and the reorientation of biotechnology toward sustainability.
Corporations are also investing in the industry. General Electric is investing $52 million in a 107,600 square foot research facility at the Technical University of Munich. By 2005, 150 scientists and researchers will focus on alternative energy systems, sensors, advanced medical imaging and automotive technologies.
Baden-Wuerttemberg is recognized as one of the leading locations for biotechnology in Europe.
The quality of life and a skilled work force are highly attractive to companies, including Boehringer Ingelheim Pharma KG, based in Biberach, Germany. The company is doubling the capacity of its production plant, which is already the largest biopharmaceutical production facility in Europe.
In 2002, more than 100 biotechnology companies established operations in the region, a figure that represents 16 percent of all German companies with direct biotechnology involvement. Most are small to medium-sized firms that focus on medical or pharmaceutical applications and R&D.
Much of the work can be found in Freiburg, the Rhine-Neckar Triangle, Stuttgart, Tuebingen, Esslingen, Reutlingen, Neckar-Alb and Ulm.
Heidelberg-based LION bioscience AG, one of the world’s leading bio information technology specialists, develops bio IT solutions for deciphering the human genome. LION has strategically expanded its activities and is now an integrated product-oriented company for the life sciences sector.
Leading public and private research institutions in Cologne do pioneering work in biological and genetic engineering at institutions such as the Institute for Genetics and Biochemistry at the University of Cologne, the Center for Molecular-Biological Medicine in Cologne, and the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding, one of three gene research centers in Germany.
In the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, ChemSite, a joint effort of government entities and large specialty chemicals producers, is a large chemical cluster with advanced infrastructure and a skilled and flexible work force.
Germany is also committed to research in nanotechnology and bringing such research to commercialization.
Six centers are dedicated to nanotechnology. Two of the largest projects are CESAR, a science center in Bonn, and an institute for carbon-reinforced materials near Karlsruhe.
In Karlsruhe, NanoMat operates as a regional network. Within NanoMat are three research centers of the Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft, 11 universities, one Max Planck Institute, the Institute of the Wissenschaftsgemeinschaft Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, the Institute of the Polish Academy of Science, three Fraunhofer Institutes, and four major companies. Corporations Degussa AG, Merck KGaA and Robert Bosch GmbH are also involved in NanoMat.
“With partners and support, we will be able to take nanoscience to nanotechnology,” said Regine Hedderich, managing director of NanoMat.
Those results deal in nanotubes and organic molecules for uses in areas such as silicon chips.
Nanotech equipment supplier Physik Instrumente, also located in Karlsruhe, is supplying nanotech labs with nanopositioning systems.
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