Shaping tomorrow's biomanufacturing: people, capabilities, and infrastructure

To be able to grow the biomanufacturing industry in the north-west, the current state of the industry must be assessed, considering its people, capabilities, and infrastructure. From there, with a holistic overview, it becomes easier to identify the opportunities and challenges facing the industry.

Opportunities

• with a global focus on sustainability and meeting net zero, there is a desire and drive to find new ways of manufacturing societal goods.

Challenges

• access to a skilled workforce is limited, with a narrow educational pipeline for those looking to enter the industry.
• biomanufacturing is still often more expensive than traditional production methods.
• renewable feedstocks are limited in supply.
• regulatory pathways are unclear and do not support a transition to a new bioeconomy.

Global targets and a communal drive

It is generally well-accepted that human activity must change if global climate targets are to be met. Industry, governments, and individuals all seek to reduce climate change through defossilisation, disruptive technologies, new policies, and collective action. Awareness and adoption of sustainable practices within industry is usually driven by regulation for business-to-business (B2B) companies, whereas business-to-consumer (B2C) companies are predominantly influenced by consumer behaviour.

Addressing the challenges

To ensure a scalable and sustainable industry there needs to be a steady stream of skilled workers, enough feedstocks to keep the bioreactors running, and geopolitical stability alongside large-scale infrastructure to keep cost and affordability within acceptable thresholds.

Currently the educational pipeline is not producing enough workers to fills the niche jobs required by the industry, for example, it is anticipated that the gene therapy industry will have 7,000 new jobs by 2026, with only a fraction of the graduating cohort possessing the requisite skills to enter the industry.

Alongside this, the currently level of infrastructure for biomanufacturing is small and sourcing enough feedstocks to produce commodity chemicals at scale is difficult. Without large infrastructure and a secure source of feedstocks, biomanufactured chemicals tend to be less cost efficient that chemicals manufactured via current processes.

To scale up to the necessary levels takes time, money, and regulatory support, which is currently preventing industry from making the change. However, this presents a chicken and egg situation with industry unlikely to change without a regulatory need to do so, and regulators reluctant to make changes if it could impact upon the economics of our industries.

Within the north-west

Currently, Liverpool and µÎµÎ´òÅÚapp are recognised as manufacturing strongholds with readily available production operators. However, outside of these hubs it is harder to find operators possessing critical biomanufacturing skills, particularly in fermentation. This may be attributed to a lack of awareness regarding transferrable skills, with a disconnect between the chemical manufacturing industry and the extensive fermentation knowledge within the food and brewing industry.

In terms of infrastructure, the north-west is generally a good place for small to medium enterprises (SMEs) to collaborate with other companies within the space. For example, a workshop participant highlighted their positive experience as an SME collaborating with other companies within the waste management and supply chain space, and repurposing equipment from other industries for their own manufacturing site.

Future solutions

To address these challenges, several actions could be taken:

• promote cross-industry skills transfer and create mechanisms to support continuing professional development (CPD).
• recognise the diverse applications of industrial biotechnology beyond biopharmaceutical manufacture.
• create a scale-up network to assist with utilities, equipment sourcing, and entrepreneurial mentoring.
• construct a facility equipped with pilot plants for small companies to utilise for demonstration or toll manufacturing.
• establish a distinct ‘biomanufacturing’ identity in the UK.

Looking ahead, the future of sustainable biomanufacturing involves cultivating a resilient ecosystem of biotechnology companies and infrastructure in the north-west with support from government to ensure a strong education ecosystem, getting biomanufacturing on Local Enterprise Partnership agendas and continuing the map the infrastructure and sector in the north-west to identify and fill any gaps.

This foresighting workshop was made up of ten participants from different stakeholder groups, from consumer goods, biopharmaceuticals, biosurfactants manufacturers, academia, to innovation catalysts and emerging technology governance. The size of the companies ranged from global, mid-sized to spin-out companies, allowing for distinction between their capabilities and infrastructure.

This article was put together by Ling Li Boon and Dr Neil Dixon.