Future of Ireland's biopharma  is AI

All the indicators globally are that the biopharma industry is moving toward a tech-driven future of  AI-powered drug-discovery research, as the industry grapples to offset the losses from an upcoming €300bn patent cliff.

After a year of volatility, the bio-pharma/life sciences sector in Ireland met up in Cork last week with a renewed sense of possibility. US president Donald Trump's shenanigans in Davos fortunately concluded without doing damage.

But Vikram Kunnath, partner at Deloitte, in his keynote delivery to the Cork conference, said that the competitiveness of Irish biopharma manufacturing was dependent on leveraging digitisation and AI.

Mr Kunnath stressed the need for enhanced training for digital and AI manufacturing technology to unlock a successful indigenous biotech ecosystem. This, he said, should be a key focus of the National Life Sciences Strategy for Ireland, currently being developed by the Government.

All the indicators globally are that the biopharma industry is moving toward a tech-driven future, characterised by AI-powered drug-discovery research, as the industry grapples to offset the losses from an upcoming €300bn patent cliff.

Even as firms tread cautiously on capital decisions, pressured by Trump administration demands for investment in the US, they are exploring AI across the value chain, from discovery research and development to downstream, clinical, and commercial-scale manufacturing.

But Paul McCabe, the group chief operations officer at APC&VLE Therapeutics, said Irish industry will depend on workforce readiness to manage AI-enabled systems and integrate these tools within a tightly regulated environment. He stressed the need for decisive action to support Ireland’s SMEs to reinforce their competitiveness in the new world of AI-driven technology.

Some of the opportunities would be in leveraging foreign direct investment to seed indigenous companies and build stronger clinical-industry interfaces and data frameworks. The 1,400 conference attendees emphasised  the need for better funding models for SMEs, pointing to the limited early-stage venture capital funders, the regulatory bottlenecks, the underdeveloped clinical-trial infrastructure, and the fragmented incubator environment.

The most critical comments were levelled at Enterprise Ireland, whom they said lacked understanding of, and support for, biopharma. Many bemoaned the lack of a single European capital market, which was driving innovators to migrate to US centres, such as NASDAQ.

There is potential for Ireland to enable biopharma manufacturing companies to leverage decades of operational data, data that is all too frequently underleveraged, because of poor automation strategies, and the need to create a world-leading centre of excellence for advanced therapies and next-generation biologics.

This centre should be a place to nurture Irish indigenous biotech start-ups and scale-ups, where they can thrive alongside multinationals and support the commercialisation of academic research in Ireland.

Attendees referenced competition from EU hubs, such as those in Flanders, Spain, Nordics, and the UK, who have made bold moves ahead of Ireland, putting it at a competitive disadvantage.

Looking ahead, US tariffs and pricing pressure are causing uncertainty for the pharma sector, which will slow investment decisions and delay patient access to new medicines in Europe, according to a new industry survey conducted for the European Confederation of Pharmaceutical Entrepreneurs.

These challenges are set to intensify. New US tariffs on branded products and continuing impacts from the Inflation Reduction Act are a reality, as is the implementation of the most-favoured-nation approach to pricing.

Management teams that want to maintain industry leadership must now reimagine their business models. Does the industry double down on breakthrough science or stick with lower-risk R&D programmes? Does it deepen international partnerships in China and India, while reassessing the role of established markets, such as the US? Does it maintain traditional sales and marketing models or adopt direct-to-customer approaches? Does it commit to US manufacturing or maintain an agile global blueprint here in Ireland?