The view outside my window.

Taking progress local

(This is Part 2 of a two-part series. Part 1 is here.)

Last year I was honored to be included in a Community crystal gazing feature, where we were asked about the biggest challenges that the biotech industry will face in the coming years. I wrote that we “must enable an active decentralization of biotech that allows new players from outside of the traditional tech and wealth hubs to develop solutions for underserved markets and needs.”

Decentralization is, clearly, a big issue for me. When I write for this blog, I scavenge for information on the latest happenings in biotech in Chile, my country, and I read what the rest of Latin American writers are reporting on, too. I’ve often said that talent is evenly distributed, but opportunities aren’t. I’d say that press coverage isn’t evenly distributed, either.

On my last article I explored how the ChileGlobal Biotec initiative seeks to put Chilean biotech on the map. It’s a government-run project, and so it makes sense it’s all about the country.

But what about the region?

It’s startling that there isn’t a biotech network for my region, started by Latin Americans and focused on Latin American issues. It seemed ridiculous enough to make us do something about it.

This is why we launched Allbiotech, which stands for América Latina: Líderes Biotech. And yes, the pun and alternate name are intentional. We want to bring together the next generation of biotechnologists in our region, fostering collaboration and accelerating the development of an ecosystem in Latin America.

I won’t go on about how biotech should not be confined to the ivory towers of research – I’ve done that too much already. But I can tell you that Latin America has great opportunities and the resources to execute applied biology, and social impact runs deep in everything we do. We believe biotech can be described through three main pillars: natural resources, innovation and social impact. I’ve had too many people working precisely in this intersection tell me that their work “isn’t really biotechnology” or that “it’s not that important” or just “not that special.”

I think they’re wrong. Biotechnology, as we see it, is the application of biotech to solve problems. It doesn’t matter if you do it in Spanish instead of English – biotech is biotech wherever it is done. And not only is it as valuable, it’s likely to better address the issue if it is conceived close to the affected individuals.

From sustainable extraction of natural resources to public perception of our scientist’s work to developing the new technologies that will solve tomorrow’s problems – all of this not only can but should be done from here, not just from the US or Europe. Otherwise, the same problems will keep getting solved over and over again, and they will always pertain to the same group of people. Paraphrasing a great teaching from my time back at Singularity: don’t solve for me without me.

We are solvers here, too.

This is our way of showing it to you.

Emilia Díaz

(This is Part 1 of a two-part series. Part 2 is here.)

The importance of a country’s brand, and how scientific communication directly impacts it.

With these posts I have tried to give an idea of what it’s like to be a scientist in Chile. Sadly, what I write is mostly not very positive. Things like Chilean talent having to go abroad to prove themselves, my country’s bias toward foreign over local talent, and the constant underpayment of young scientists.  I haven’t provided the most encouraging panorama.

I’ve been trying to solve the riddle of how can science be viewed as this supremely difficult thing but pay the people who actually do it like McDonald’s workers. There are obviously many sides to this – we can argue about how the government should do this, and the industry should do that – but there’s a guilty party we don’t often examine in this light, and it is us.

Let’s face it: us scientists are absolutely terrible at talking. By “talking” here I also mean writing, and communicating in general. We are taught from college and maybe even high school that we are “number people” and that “word people” go to other careers, and that we should not even worry about communication, because it’s all in the numbers. Just show that nice graph with all your results and finish that equation with a flourish. We never give communication the importance it deserves.

If only there was some sort of network of Chilean biotech leaders properly positioned to help communicate the achievements of our local industry!

Cue ChileGlobal Biotec.

With this initiative, Imagen de Chile (literally, Image of Chile) seeks to leverage their already existing talent pool to foster new biotech initiatives through the generation and strengthening of a network of more than 1,000 entrepreneurs and high-ranked Chilean executives in the US. This doesn’t necessarily improve the whole “Chileans still need to go prove themselves abroad” issue but at least makes use of it as social proof, elevating the scientists in the network and amplifying their voices not just in the ears of those back home, but in the ears of the whole world and on behalf of those back home.

Communicating our advances in science is especially important for a country that’s still struggling to properly cross the gap from development to developed, and contributes to our validation toward the international community. The initiative was launched in San Francisco on June last year, as a parallel event to BIO. The attendants were entrepreneurs with established businesses in the US whose names are continually mentioned back home, with more than a little awe (like Komal Dadlani, founder of Lab4U, and Alejandro Tocigl, fellow Singularitarian and founder of Miroculus), plus representatives from all the organizations implicated in fostering biotech and innovation in the country.

The organizers of the launch said that it’s “not enough to be connected physically and digitally, intellectual connection is also paramount.” The experiences and knowledge of those Chileans who have gone abroad can help facilitate alliances and new connections, and ChileGlobal Biotec can be the conduit.

It has been about a year since then, and ChileGlobal is helping cement biotech’s place in our country. What’s the next logical step?

To go local.

Coming up: Allbiotech.

Emilia Díaz