What actions, if any, should be taken by the Mexican National Council for Science and Technology to increase the number of healthcare biotechnology start-ups in the country?
The client for this policy analysis is the National Council for Science and Technology of Mexico.
"Increase the number" means that the government will promote creation of small companies but is not going to create them directly. There is a wide range of policy tools for encouraging creation of enterprises: from tax incentives and subsidies to changing existent regulations.
"Healthcare biotechnology start-ups" specifies the type of companies being promoted. For example, agricultural start-ups are not included in this policy research because there are significant differences in the regulations that apply to science and technology in healthcare and agriculture in Mexico. Therefore, an analysis of both fields of biotechnology would become too complicated.
"In the country" specifies that the start-ups should be created on the territory of Mexico (headquarters, laboratories and production facilities should be located there and Mexicans should be employed). Therefore, start-ups created by Mexican scientists who emigrated to Europe or the United States are not considered in this analysis.
Brief background.
Mexico faces a number of challenges in terms of generation of innovations. Although there have been some advances in the level of innovations in the country, the existing challenges to growth and development include high monopolization of industries and an unequal distribution of wealth (Salazar, 2014). The number of graduate and postgraduate student in the life sciences increases each year, but there is a lack of high-skilled employment opportunities to absorb the students. This underutilized and highly-qualified workforce prefers to emigrate from the country, so a phenomenon of "brain drain" can be observed.
Since the decade of 1990s, the Mexican government has launched a new strategy to support innovations in the country - creation of networks and ties between different actors in the biotechnology industry. One of the examples of such networks can be found in the state of Baja California (BTJ-Forum, 2008). The Medical Products Cluster of the Californias includes manufacturers of medical products on both sides of the US-Mexico border. The result of creation of this cluster is increase in competitiveness of the companies, increase in the level of employment and enhanced innovation potential of all the actors in the network.
References.
1. Biotechnology Journal (2008). Biotech round the world: focus on Mexico. Biotechnol. J. 2008, 3, 1131-1134.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/biot.200890094/abstract
2. Salazar, M. (2014). Innovation and Development in Mexico: The Promising Road Ahead. Wilson Center. http://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/innovation-and-development-mexico-the-promising-road-ahead
The client for this policy analysis is the National Council for Science and Technology of Mexico.
"Increase the number" means that the government will promote creation of small companies but is not going to create them directly. There is a wide range of policy tools for encouraging creation of enterprises: from tax incentives and subsidies to changing existent regulations.
"Healthcare biotechnology start-ups" specifies the type of companies being promoted. For example, agricultural start-ups are not included in this policy research because there are significant differences in the regulations that apply to science and technology in healthcare and agriculture in Mexico. Therefore, an analysis of both fields of biotechnology would become too complicated.
"In the country" specifies that the start-ups should be created on the territory of Mexico (headquarters, laboratories and production facilities should be located there and Mexicans should be employed). Therefore, start-ups created by Mexican scientists who emigrated to Europe or the United States are not considered in this analysis.
Brief background.
Mexico faces a number of challenges in terms of generation of innovations. Although there have been some advances in the level of innovations in the country, the existing challenges to growth and development include high monopolization of industries and an unequal distribution of wealth (Salazar, 2014). The number of graduate and postgraduate student in the life sciences increases each year, but there is a lack of high-skilled employment opportunities to absorb the students. This underutilized and highly-qualified workforce prefers to emigrate from the country, so a phenomenon of "brain drain" can be observed.
Since the decade of 1990s, the Mexican government has launched a new strategy to support innovations in the country - creation of networks and ties between different actors in the biotechnology industry. One of the examples of such networks can be found in the state of Baja California (BTJ-Forum, 2008). The Medical Products Cluster of the Californias includes manufacturers of medical products on both sides of the US-Mexico border. The result of creation of this cluster is increase in competitiveness of the companies, increase in the level of employment and enhanced innovation potential of all the actors in the network.
References.
1. Biotechnology Journal (2008). Biotech round the world: focus on Mexico. Biotechnol. J. 2008, 3, 1131-1134.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/biot.200890094/abstract
2. Salazar, M. (2014). Innovation and Development in Mexico: The Promising Road Ahead. Wilson Center. http://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/innovation-and-development-mexico-the-promising-road-ahead
Very interesting topic! I liked how there was great specificity with regards to the client, as well as what kind of startups the policy was supposed to target (healthcare startups). I also liked how the scope was well-defined with the definitions as well as the limiting of startups to "in the country". Good job!
ReplyDeleteMy comments below are more of just comments/suggestions - overall I found the question well written.
I thought that the word "increase" was a little vague. While I would agree that there may be a lack of a better word to describe it, I thought that increase was unclear as to whether it was with regards to the numbers, or the economic output, or the employment (as implied in your brief description), and so forth.
I also thought that "in the country" was well-defined, but could be even further improved (perhaps not as part of the policy question). There are many firm networks nowadays that are international in scope - even as a startup, they may find it advantageous to start off as an "International New Venture" (see "Toward a Theory of International New Ventures" by Oviatt and McDougall). Would that be in your scope too?
Mexico is a huge country - I'm not sure if you might want to make it more regionally-focused, if that helps (at all) in your analysis.
This blog is well written, it imposes the question on "What actions, if any, should be taken by the Mexican National Council for Science and Technology to increase the number of healthcare biotechnology start-ups in the country? " And the author targets that the client is "National Council for Science and Technology of Mexico". A lot of background information has also been introduced to make reader easy understand. References are provided as well. Good job!
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