This paper provided a framework for how Boston successfully built its “innovation capacity” in the life sciences and became one of the most innovative places in the world in just twenty years. In 2008 then-Governor Deval Patrick and the Massachusetts legislature created a ten-year, one-billion-dollar initiative to transform Massachusetts from a leading life sciences academic research hub to a world-leading life sciences innovation hub, where new technologies could be translated, developed, and commercialized. Today, Boston is recognized as the best life science ecosystem globally. Patrick’s team, including Susan Windham-Bannister, focused on building the long-term goal of innovation capacity: knowing how to produce one innovation after another on a sustained basis. In Windham-Bannister’s framework, innovation capacity was built around five enablers. 1. Academic culture 2. Entrepreneurial culture (including risk capital) 3. Workforce 4. Infrastructure 5. The ecosystem Boston succeeded because it utilized a backbone organization called Massachusetts Life Sciences Center (MSLC) to build a thriving ecosystem. The multi-layered nature of this network, which included investors, founders, scientists, and corporations, resulted in new pipelines for resource transfer throughout the network. They made diversity (different stakeholders and talents) and collaboration core principles. They also defined a clear purpose, a long-term shared view, and a structure to attract players.
Joseph, Diana, Susan Windham-Bannister, and Mikel Mangold. “What Corporates Can Do to Help an Innovation Ecosystem Thrive-and Why They Should Do It.” Journal of Commercial Biotechnology 26, no. 1 (March 16, 2021).
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