Increasingly, biotech firms are calling Princeton home

Drive around the area, and you'll see them, one after another: Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, Bristol-Myers. Over the past couple years, a number of pharmaceutical and biotechnology firms has sprung up in the Princeton region.

This growth is far from surprising, as New Jersey is considered by many to have the most thriving pharmaceutical industry in the country. The greatest concentration of prescription drug companies in the country is in this state, as well as the headquarters of 20 of the largest pharmaceutical and medical technology companies in the world.

New Jersey hosts more than 10,200 high-tech establishments, many of them in the Princeton region. And more than a third of the new drugs approved by the FDA in the 1990s were developed in the state, according to the New Jersey department of commerce.

But why New Jersey, and specifically the Princeton region? According to company officials, the area offers an overwhelming array of advantages. Among them rank its well-educated workforce and efficient transportation system.

Further, New Jersey's world-class public and private facilities serve research and development. A network of seven technology business incubators across the state provides small and start-up firms with business assistance. Administered through New Jersey's academic sector, they currently accommodate about 111 businesses.

In addition, biotech companies benefit from a competitive technology-transfer program and the Technology Center, a 50-acre site with inexpensive laboratory and production facilities. The official New Jersey website states the goal of the Center as "offering and enhancing academic [and] industrial technology collaboration opportunities in a variety of disciplines . . . to increase productivity, global competitiveness, and profits."

The state of New Jersey has created a Commission on Science & Technology to oversee the development of policies and programs in science and technology that will promote economic development and employment in New Jersey. It states its objectives to include, "encouraging business development through Commission programs designed to provide assistance for science and technology-oriented businesses, facilitating the establishment of new enterprises in science and technology, and supporting the preparation of a workforce which is technology literate."

But one other major attraction to biotech companies in the area is the University, particularly its molecular biology, biophysics and biochemistry departments. Dr. Athanase La-vidas, chairman of Lavipharm Laboratories, said, "We have access to the best of the nation's scientific talent."

He added that the location, "keeps us close to our partners and potential partners."

Proximity to funding sources is also a major pull. Dan Malachuk, Worldwide Director of Business Location Services for Arthur Andersen in New York City, stated, "Generally, we're looking at fairly prosperous places which are attractive to people who make money and want to spend it."

Plus, when pharmaceutical executives living in New Jersey move to another company, they tend to want to remain in the area, creating a lasting biotech community.

With these attractive qualities in its favor for both domestic companies as well as those from abroad, the Princeton area is becoming to the biotech and pharmaceutical industries what Silicon Valley is to the computer technology industry.