Life Sciences

Industry Size and Composition | Labor Force | Business Competitiveness | Innovation

Greater Toronto’s highly skilled life sciences work force, its successful attraction of international researchers, and 20,000 trainees in bio-tech related degree programs makes it one of the most competitive life science centres in the world.

The Toronto region has over 60 hospitals, 10 of which are teaching hospitals, including affiliates of the University of Toronto, Canada’s largest medical school. With 17,000 researchers the University of Toronto alone invests over $400 million annually in bio-medical research.

Geographically close to major U.S. life science centres, Greater Toronto offers biomedical research and pharmaceutical manufacturing costs that are lower than New York, Boston, San Jose, Metro DC and Dallas-Ft.Worth, its traditional competitors

The Greater Toronto Area life sciences sector has brought the world over a century of historic medical breakthroughs, such as insulin, heparin, rabies vaccine, the heart pacemaker and baby pablum.

Industry Size and Composition

The GTA is home to more than half of Canada’s brand pharmaceutical manufacturers, and 80% of the country’s generic drug manufacturers. A related health biotechnology sector is emerging
(Source: Graytek Management Inc., Toronto Cluster Report, 2004).

GTA Life Sciences Figures

Major Pharmaceutical Companies Operating in GTA

Key Companies Using Biotechnology in the GTA

Medical Device Companies Operating in GTA

Toronto region has the second-largest stock exchange (Toronto Stock Exchange – TSX) and the fourth-largest financial service industry sector in North America. As such, life sciences companies have close access to knowledgeable equity and debt capital.

GTA financial institutions that specialize in the life sciences industry sector:

• MDS Capital
• Canadian Medical Discovery Fund
• Royal Bank Ventures Inc.
• Orion Securities

Labor Force

The Greater Toronto Area is continually creating a well-educated workforce that will support the life sciences sector. University of Toronto is truly a world leader and rates with the world’s finest schools. For instance, its medical school is about the same size as that of Harvard and its affiliated research institutions comprise the fourth largest medical R&D community in North America. It is estimated that 17,000 researchers work at the University of Toronto and in its teaching hospitals.

Life sciences businesses can also find a supply of new talent across Ontario, thanks to the province’s 17 universities, which turn out more than 17,000 graduates per year in mathematics, engineering, sciences, and the health professions (Source: Ministry of Ontario).

Some of the life sciences related-educational programs in the GTA:

• Master in Biomedical Communications and Master in Biotechnology at the University of Toronto at Mississauga (UTM)
• Chemical Lab technician-pharmaceutical at Seneca College
• Food and drug technology at Durham
• Pharmacy at the University of Toronto
• Industrial pharmaceutical technology at the Toronto Institute of Pharmaceutical Technology (TIPT is the only professional school in North America that offers education and practical training in this field)

In Ontario there are 33,000 highly educated people who work in biotech, pharmaceutical and medical devices sectors.

Labor Force In Medical and Biotechnology Sub-clusters, Toronto CMA (2003)

Business Competitiveness

Overall costs of doing research in Greater Toronto Area is one of the lowest in the world, especially when compared to other major centres in North America.

Biomedical R&D Costs

Clinical Trials Operating Costs

KPMG’s 2004 Competitive Alternatives Study ranks Canada’s aggregate business costs at 8% lower than the United States and France, 6% lower than the UK, 7% lower than Italy and 22% lower than Germany and Japan.

Significant provincial tax incentives in the form of R&D tax credits also make the GTA an ideal location for R&D facilities.

GTA-based life sciences companies can take advantage of provincial tax incentives such as the R&D Challenge Fund, Ontario Innovation Tax Credit, Ontario Business - Research Institute Tax Credit, Ontario New Technology Tax Incentive, Graduate Transitions Tax Credit.

For more information on tax incentives programs and other related R&D funds or programs, go to: Government support programs

Innovation

Greater Toronto achievements include the development of the original heart pacemaker, artificial larynx and pancreas, and the first nerve and double lung transplants. Insulin and anti-rabies vaccines were discovered in the GTA, and Pablum, the world’s first commercial baby food, was developed here.

Other breakthroughs include the isolation of T-cell and dopamine receptors, the Ryanodine receptor, and genes for Cystic Fibrosis, Myotonic Dystrophy, Fanconi Anemia, Alzheimer’s and breast cancer. A recent study indicated that Canadian researchers had contributed to the discovery of more than 25% of disease-causing genes.

Greater Toronto researchers are world leaders in some of the most highly competitive and rapidly advancing areas of modern health care research, including the exploration of human diseases at the cellular and molecular levels.

Biomedical research is primarily involved with applications in human healthcare in the following disciplines:

• bio-informatics
• bio-instrumentation
• bio-pharmaceuticals (therapeutics)
• diagnostics
• vaccines

with a special focus on research in:

• biomaterials
• biomedical engineering
• cancer
• cardiovascular disease
• central nervous systems disorders
• human genomics
• organ transplantation
• women health

Toronto region has also an excellent clinical trial infrastructure and the multi-ethnic make-up of its population makes it an ideal location for conducting clinical trials.

Research and Development Institutes

The Joseph and Wolf Lebovic Centre for Human Genome Research and Molecular Medicine is the largest of its kind in Canada and one of only a few in the world.

Active principal investigators are located at the University of Toronto Faculty of Medicine, and research institutes at Mount Sinai Hospital (The Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute), The Hospital for Sick Children, The Ontario Cancer Institute (Princess Margaret Hospital, University Health Network), Toronto General Hospital Research Institute and Toronto Western Research Institute (University Health Network), Sunnybrook and Women's College Health Science Centre, St. Michael's Hospital, The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, (formerly The Clarke Institute of Psychiatry) and other hospitals and health institutions in the area.

Public Sector R&D facilities include:

• Hospital for Sick Children Research Institute
• The Genome Database
• Photonics Research Ontario
• Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute
• Mount Sinai Hospital
• Joseph & Wolf Lebovic Centre for Human Genome Research & Molecular Medicine
• University Health Network
• University of Toronto

Private Sector R&D facilities include:

• Amgen Institute
• Apotex
• Aventis Pasteur
• Bayer
• Eli Lily Canada
• Genpharm
• Hemosol
• Janssen-Ortho
• Pfizer Canada

Research & Commercialization

The Medical and Related Sciences Discovery District (MaRS) focuses on the commercialization process in order to develop the GTA life sciences cluster. Situated in downtown Toronto, MaRS is centred at the University of Toronto and more than 30 other biotech R&D centres.

MaRS provides the academic and research community with information and resources to fuel the commercialization of discovery. MaRS helps researchers connect to funding, experts, and equipment to advance the development of world–class knowledge and technology.

GTA Life Sciences Investments (sample only)

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