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Biotech leaders to ask Congress for bailout
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Representatives from the U.S. biotech industry will journey to Congress today to seek a government bailout. The New York Times reports that industry execs--led by BIO--want to exchange future tax credits from future profits in exchange for cash now to support research and development. And that support could add up to hundreds of millions if not billions of dollars.
As Times biotech reporter Andrew Pollack notes in his story, the appeal comes at a time that small and and medium-sized biotechs are running out of cash and fresh funds are hard to come by. FierceBiotech has reported daily on the carnage as developers shed workers and programs in a desperate attempt to stay afloat.
Biotech has at least one influential champion in its corner. Allyson Y. Schwartz, who sits on the House Ways and Means Committee, says she'll offer the proposal for inclusion in an upcoming stimulus package, and says many of her colleagues are likely to come out in support.
"Innovation and technology are growth areas for American businesses and American workers and should be part of this package," Schwartz told the Times. At the same time, skeptics aren't hard to come by. One notes that small companies that emply 30 people don't offer much by the way of stimulus for the broad economy.
- read the report in the New York Times
Related Articles:
Economic crisis hammers small, mid-sized biotechs
Credit crisis pushes biotechs to the brink
Crisis forces biotechs to cut R&D, preserve cash
Struggling UK biotechs call for funding
Comments
By KGKPHD | Posted 2:01pm | December 10, 2008
That's it! I've been around this industry since it's birth. I've watched idiot CEOs piss away money; run after more; piss that away; go public; and walk away with loads of money from companies that never had a chance to begin with. Then they all got jobs as CEOs at other new biotechs where they repeated the same process and screwed the late-entry stockholders once more. Let the management of these companies turn back all the money they made on options and bonuses (as well as the venture capitalists and investment bankers, who are equally culpable) to saving THEIR comanies. I'm against the investment industry's bail-out; the airline bail-out; the car company bail-out and now this BS bail-out. Let the perpetrators pay --- not the taxpayers.
By Anonymous | Posted 3:59pm | December 10, 2008
This is unbelievable! Since the bank bailout, everyone is in line with their hands out to have the taxpayers fix their mistakes. What kinds of messages are we sending to companies and our global audience?
Take responsibilities and get some pride in yourselves and your work. Have these people no faith in in their own abilities? I don't care what the economy is doing, there are plenty of people, public and private alike, who would be willing to invest in biotech.
The idea of taxpayers bailing out biotech, the auto industry, fiancials is beyond comprehension. They brought on their problems. If they can't fix them on their own, let them go broke and have the capitalist system replace them with responsible, competent corporate leaders and companies.
By Anonymous | Posted 2:21pm | December 11, 2008
"In the struggle for survival, the fittest win out at the expense of their rivals because they succeed in adapting themselves best to their environment."
- Charles Darwin
By Anonymous | Posted 1:25pm | December 18, 2008
If we are footing the bill, congress should be paying us, not us the congress! Were not making any money on all these bail-outs, wheres the intrest for us? Banks get it why not us.
