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16 Jul 2004
Speech by Dr Tony Tan Keng Yam, Deputy Prime Minister and Co-Ordinating Minister for Security And Defence, at the opening ceremony of Pfizer Asia Pacific Pte Ltd's new multi-purpose manufacturing facility at Tuas Biomedical Park held on Fri, 16 July 2004 at 10am
Your Excellency Mr Frank Lavin, US Ambassador to Singapore
Dr Henry McKinnell, Chairman and CEO of Pfizer Inc.
Distinguished Guests
Ladies and Gentlemen
I am delighted to join you this morning to celebrate the opening of Pfizer's new S$600 million multi-purpose active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) manufacturing facility.
This state-of-the-art API plant is one of Pfizer's most technology-intensive facilities worldwide and will employ 250 staff.
The establishment of this plant is a significant endorsement of Singapore's manufacturing capabilities and underlines Singapore's position today as one of the strategic sites globally for high-value pharmaceutical production.
Although Biomedical Sciences is a relatively young cluster here, it is already one of the key pillars of Singapore's manufacturing sector, and forms an integral part of our drive to develop Singapore into a knowledge-based economy.
Update on Singapores Biomedical Sciences Initiative
In 2000, Singapore launched the initiative to build up the Biomedical Sciences cluster as an important pillar of our manufacturing sector. I am pleased to note that much has been achieved over the past four years.
Manufacturing
Biomedical manufacturing output has almost doubled in size since year 2000 and is likely to reach our 2005 target manufacturing output of S$12 billion by this year, one year ahead of schedule.
The Biomedical Sciences is already the third largest in the Manufacturing sector after Electronics and Chemicals.
Total employment in the Biomedical Sciences sector increased by 35% to 7,500 in the past 4 years. The value-add per worker of S$900,000 is one of the highest, compared to the Manufacturing sector average of S$174,000 per worker.
Encouraged by the progress we have made in the last four years, we have set the goal of doubling Singapore's biomedical manufacturing output from $12 billion this year to S$24 billion within the next ten years with total employment of 15,000 people.
To support the Biomedical Sciences industry, we will strengthen our process development capabilities. First, we will develop strong biologics development and manufacturing expertise in Singapore. The Bioprocessing Technology Institute (BTI)'s research and graduate training efforts are imperative in this initiative. Some areas of focus are expression engineering, microbial fermentation, animal cell technology, downstream purification, and analytics. BTI's efforts complement A-Bio Pharma, a home-grown biologics contract manufacturing operation with a cGMP mammalian cell culture facility for monoclonal antibodies and other therapeutic proteins.
Second, we will develop pilot scale manufacturing capabilities to support the development of new chemical entities. The Institute of Chemical and Engineering Sciences (ICES) will develop state-of-the-art kilo-lab scale facilities to provide custom synthesis services to both industry and academia, by next year.
Research
Beyond manufacturing, in the area of R&D, we have built the Biopolis complex to be our new centre for biomedical sciences research.
Even though the construction of Biopolis has only just completed, almost 90% of the space has already been taken up or committed to tenants. By the end of this year, Biopolis will be populated by more than 1,600 researchers and personnel from more than 26 nationalities. It will be home to more than 25 companies and organisations. These include A*STAR's 5 biomedical research institutes, 10 pharmaceutical and biotech research companies, 2 international organizations, 1 incubator and other related government bodies.
The high take-up rate indicates strong interest in the unique and attractive research environment that Biopolis offers. Plans are underway to develop Phase 2 of the Biopolis with development likely to start by early 2005.
The diverse and interesting mix of talents and tenants, and the co-habitation of public and industry R&D, will facilitate the exchange of expertise and ideas. It will help build both formal and informal linkages between A*STAR's research institutes and industry, as well as encourage the flow of R&D talent from the public sector to industry.
To further support and deepen our growing base of biomedical R&D activities, we will continue to attract and develop talent, both local and foreign.
Although we welcome foreign R&D talent to come, work and live in Singapore, we cannot rely solely on foreign talent to fuel our biomedical sciences development. We must and we will continue to invest heavily in young Singaporeans. Since 2001, A*STAR has awarded over 450 undergraduate and graduate, local and overseas scholarships. Our aim is to train at least 1,000 young Singaporean PhD students through this scholarship program by 2010.
As regards foreign talent, historically, foreign researchers and scientists have come from our neighboring Asian countries. However, over the past few years, we have seen an increasing inflow of foreign scientists from many other parts of the world, with varied training and cultural backgrounds. In addition, A*STAR has recently launched an attractive program to further recruit international post doctoral graduates to come to work at Biopolis. These augur well for the future of R&D in Singapore because diversity in R&D human capital fosters new ideas and connects us better with the rest of the scientific world.
Our pro-local and pro-foreign approach towards developing Singapore's human capital will be a critical success factor for the future of drug discovery and development in Singapore.
Conclusion
Singapore's biomedical sciences initiative has seen significant achievements since year 2000, the year when Pfizer started the construction of this facility. In spite of the considerable progress made, much work lies ahead. The development of the Biomedical Sciences cluster is a long-term commitment for the Singapore government.
Pfizer and Singapore have a shared future. Together with Pfizer's existing early phase clinical research, regional marketing and IT operations in Singapore, I am confident that the long-term strategic partnership between Pfizer and Singapore will continue to grow in the years ahead.
In closing, let me congratulate Dr Henry McKinnell, his management team and all the staff at Pfizer for their exceptional dedication and hard work in the successful establishment of this plant.
I wish Pfizer every success in Singapore.
It now gives me great pleasure to declare open Pfizer Asia Pacific's multi-purpose manufacturing facility.
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