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Industrial and Innovation Policies in the Mexican Biotechnology Sector

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Abstract

This article analyzes the possibilities of an industrial ascent of the Mexican biopharma sector based on creative imitation. The emergence of various national endogenous technological change initiatives as creative imitation processes is associated with late industrialization and favorable or unfavorable circumstances for developing countries to achieve a dynamic insertion into the technological paradigms of emerging sectors. Given the above, the empirical goal of this study is to identify, typify, and catalogue the modes of insertion configuring technological trajectories within the pharmaceutical industry in Mexico. This study discusses the potential for knowledge-intensive production activities to modify the production structure and allow for production specialization based on increasing activities that provide higher productivity and more added value in Mexico. This entails the emergence of new areas in the sector with the role of creating new technologies and performing cross-sectional dissemination of biotech solutions in the value chain associated with human health.

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Notes

  1. Steroids, fermentation and semi-synthetic antibiotics, other microbicides, non-steroidal anti-inflammatory products, and biopharmaceuticals (fabotherapic antivenoms, interferons, erythropoietins) are produced in Mexico, among others, but many therapeutic groups are not produced in the country (SS, Secretaría de Salud 2005).

  2. Standing out among these groups are the Biotechnology Institute (IBT) and the Center for Genomic Sciences (CCG), plus other UNAM’s centers, institutes, schools, and universities; CINVESTAV’s Mexico City Unit, and especially its National Biodiversity Genomics Laboratory (LANGEBIO) at Irapuato; UAM’s Iztapalapa and Cuajimalpa units, and 11 IPN schools offering 15 postgraduate programs associated with biotechnology (Stezano 2016).

  3. The following centers within the SEP-CONACYT system are focused on pharmaceutical biotechnology: Ensenada Center for Scientific Research and Higher Education (CISESE), Yucatan Center for Scientific Research (CICY), and the State of Jalisco Center for Research and Technological Design Assistance. (CIATEJ).

  4. The first and foremost is the Mexican Social Security Institute (IMMS), created in 1943. Based on number of published articles, next in the line are the national institutes of Public Health (1991), Cardiology (1944), Cancer Research (1946), Lung Research (1975), Psychiatry (1979), Respiratory Diseases (1982), and Medical Sciences and Nutrition (1980) (Niosi et al. 2013).

  5. A biotechnology patent survey for the period from 2009 to 2014 by Morales and Amaro (2016: 31–32) revealed that 50 biotechnology patents registered with USPTO are held by Mexican proprietaries: 61,4% were registered by public research centers, most of them ran by UNAM. Similarly, only 1% of biotechnology patents registered by the Mexican Institute of Industrial Property (IMPI) were submitted by Mexican agents, more than half of them by UNAM (45%) and CINVESTAV (10%). Of the pharmaceutical patents registered in Mexico by firms in those years, 89% are from foreign firms with a previous international registration that, on average, was obtained 5.6 years earlier in some other country. That is, the foreign pharmaceutical firms patent in Mexico products that they developed years ago in another place. Therefore, the registration of the patent in the local market obeys more to a commercial strategy than to the development of innovation capabilities. This situation distorts the local market because it encourages oligopolistic competition based on the commercialization of products, but not their innovative development (Morales and Villavicencio 2015: 156–158).

  6. The most important are the following three: the UNAM Institute of Biotechnology (industrial applications), LANGEBIO (agricultural applications), and the National Institute of Genomic Medicine (INMENGEN), which develops genomic medicine (Stezano 2016).

  7. Bioclon, one of the largest Mexican biotech firms, was acquired by Laboratorios Silanes. Silanes is a national pharmaceutical company that produces generic antivenoms; it employs 100 staff. Probiomed produces erythropoietins and other recombinant drugs; it employs 990 staff, most of them working on biotech R&D (Niosi et al. 2013).

  8. Mandatory licensing of patented drugs abroad was how Mexico obtained generic drugs prior to NAFTA. This did not involve the discovery, development and patenting of medicines by national firms. What was done through the mandatory licensing strategy was to obtain a license from a foreign firm to produce low-cost essential medicines for the population. Thus, what was licensed was the generic drug patent to be produced at a lower cost nationwide (Shadlen 2009).

  9. These companies are Fármaco Continentales, IVAX, Laboratorios Zafiro, Laboratorios Hormona, IFACeltics, Kener, and Liomont

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  1. Center for Research and Innovation in Information and Communication Technologies, INFOTEC, Mexico City, CDMX, Mexico

    Federico Stezano

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Stezano, F. Industrial and Innovation Policies in the Mexican Biotechnology Sector. J Ind Compet Trade 19, 123–140 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10842-018-0281-8

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