Biotechnology & Life Sciences, Industry Sector Summaries, Manitoba Competitiveness, Training and Trade

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Biotechnology & Life Sciences

Sector Structure

Size: An estimated 4,200 persons are employed in the life sciences sector.

Dominant Activities:

Pharmaceutical & biopharmaceutical R&D and production, including: speciality hyperimmune plasma products and recombinant therapeutic products, sustained release pharmaceuticals, monoclonal antibodies, fermentation, downstream processing and purification.
Agricultural biotechnology, including: development of crop varieties with improved pest resistance and enhanced qualities, cereal and oilseed quality and pathology, cereal genomics, identification and extraction of high value materials from crops.

Structure & Concentration:

Manitoba is home to 41 companies operating in this sector, with 2,300 employees. Of these, five companies account for over eighty percent of the employed persons in the sector. The industry is complemented by 30 research and development establishments, representing employment of 1,900. There are 23 service firms that support the life sciences industries.

Highlights:

Manitoba’s biotechnology sector has grown by 40 per cent in the past three years. Ernst & Young’s Resurgence: Global Biotechnology Report 2004 ranked Manitoba as the fastest growing biotechnology sector in Canada.
Manitoba is a centre of excellence in the areas of infectious disease identification and management. A significant concentration of the province’s activities in these areas resides in the Canadian Science Centre for Human and Animal Health, the Public Health Agency of Canada, and the International Centre for Infectious Diseases.
While Manitoba has only 4% of Canada’s population, it is home to 8% of the national biotech activity. The industry is characterized by a strong entrepreneurial spirit, with recent start-ups representing more than one-third of existing companies.
Manitoba is home to the only biopharmaceutical manufacturing activity in Western Canada – centred around Cangene Corporation, Apotex Fermentation, Biovail and Vita Health.
Winnipeg’s Cangene Corporation, a world leader in specialty hyper-immune plasma and biotechnology products, has been awarded contracts by the US Center for Disease Control (CDC) to develop drugs to respond to potential biological attacks.
The National Research Council’s Institute for Biodiagnostics, in Winnipeg, is the most advanced facility in Canada for studying and developing non-invasive diagnostic tools such as NMR and MRI technologies.
The Canadian Science Centre for Human and Animal Health is the first and only global centre with level 4 bio-containment capability for the study of both human and animal disease.
Manitoba enjoys a global leadership position in the development of cereal and oilseed crop varieties. The University of Manitoba’s Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences is recognized for the leading role it played in developing canola. The Cereal Research Centre, located at the University, is Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada’s lead centre for cereal genomics.
Manitoba is home to Canada’s first systems biology program that supports biomedical research focused specifically on transplantation, autoimmunity, cancer and viral infections.
Manitoba has established the Richardson Centre for Functional Foods and Nutraceuticals, the National Centre for Agri-Food Research in Medicine and the Food Development Centre to assist industry in developing and commercializing functional food ingredients and natural health products.

Sector Capabilities

Areas of Focus: Infectious Diseases, Cardiovascular & Respiratory Diseases, Oncology, Neuroscience, Metabolism & Nutrition, Nutraceuticals & Functional Foods, Cell Biology & Gene Technology, Plant Breeding, Diagnostics, Contract Research.

Examples of Existing Technological Capabilities

Metabolic Engineering
Bioinformatics
Gene Expression Analysis
Oligonucleotide Synthesis
Controlled Environments
Crop quality analysis
Molecular mapping
Plant & Animal Breeding
Bacterial Fermentation
Molecular Mapping
Proteomics
Gene Cloning
Quality traits
Transformation
Genomics
Physiological stress
Conventional & Hybrid Breeding
Marker-assisted Gene Selection
Level 3 & 4 Biocontainment
Biological Mass Spectrometry
Product development
Insects & Disease Management
Marker assisted gene selection
Nutraceuticals & Functional Foods

Competitive Strengths

Dynamic and cooperative industry cluster — Manitoba’s industry is complemented and supported by a strong research infrastructure comprised of world-class university and government laboratories, and research institutes. Of particular significance are the synergies that the industry is able to achieve between biotechnological research in agriculture and the life sciences.
Low factor costs — The industry benefits from low cost, high-quality agricultural commodities, low occupancy and operating costs, a generous R&D tax credit program, and a well-educated workforce. An affordable and high quality of life helps companies and institutions to attract research talent.
Highly Productive Agricultural Resource Base — Manitoba's soils and climatic conditions make it ideally suited for the production of a wide range of crops including cereals, oilseeds, pulses and horticultural crops.

Trends

New research investment initiatives include:

Development of SmartPark at the University of Manitoba, which will house an incubation centre for life sciences technology, and a $25 million nutraceutical and functional foods centre
Construction of a new $3 million breast cancer research facility by CancerCare Manitoba.
Establishment of the I.H. Asper Clinical Research Institute, which conducts early phase clinical research on diabetes, cardiovascular disease and neurological disorders.
Construction of a new, $15 million business incubation centre to be located at the National Research Centre's Institute for Biodiagnostics.
Recent expansion of Biovail Corporation’s Steinbach facility, to accommodate the company’s new biopharmaceutical products.
Development of the Manitoba Centre for Proteomics, which partners with the University of Manitoba’s internationally recognized time-of-flight mass spectrometry research group.

Key Players

Contact

Mr. Douglas McCartney,
Director, Life Sciences
Manitoba Science, Technology, Energy & Mines
Tel: (204) 945-6298
Fax: (204) 945-3977
dmccartney@gov.mb.ca

Mr. Allen Sturko,
Project Manager, Agricultural Sector
Manitoba Science, Technology, Energy & Mines
Tel: (204) 945-0975
Fax: (204) 945-3977
asturko@gov.mb.ca

www.manitobalifesciences.ca