How Former Drug Company Labs Are Becoming Contract Research Firms

England, 4 Aug 2018: Europe’s drug industry is going through an efficiency drive to cut costs, raise productivity, and focus on more profitable therapeutic areas. Research chemists and other scientists face the prospect of losing their jobs as staff numbers are reduced. Whole research units are being closed or transferred to new owners that want to economize with fewer employees.

But researchers have a reasonable prospect of finding work in an R&D sector that is no longer dominated by pharmaceutical multinationals. In addition to drug discovery start-ups, new jobs can be found in the growing collection of contract research organizations (CROs) serving the discovery and preclinical stages of research.

These CROs earn their revenue by providing a range of support services to both big and small companies at the leading edge of drug technology. Many CRO research staffers are former employees of big pharma companies where the priority is no longer the in-house discovery of new molecules. In some cases, they even work in facilities spun off by their former employers.

Life in CROs isn’t always as cushy as it was in big pharma, but it’s never dull. Even if CRO scientists work in familiar surroundings, they must constantly adapt to new technologies. They cover areas like process development, compound synthesis, assay development, target validation, screening services, lead optimization, and computational support. Chemical & Engineering News