The BioBusiness Asia conference — part of the Bio Taiwan exhibition — opened in Taipei yesterday, attended by business, government and academic representatives in the biotechnology sector from countries in the Asia-Pacific region.
The two-day conference is focused on the topics of precision medicine and future healthcare, as well as biotech investment strategies, with the participants set to discuss the development of precision medicine, ways to establish innovative cooperation with international pharmaceutical companies and the sharing of successful commercial models.
The discussions are also set to touch on the business opportunities and market challenges facing the biotech industry and the sector’s future development, according to its organizer the Taiwan Bio Industry Organization.
At the opening ceremony, Bio Taiwan 2015 chairman Johnsee Lee (李鍾熙) said that US President Barack Obama launched the Precision Medicine Initiative early this year, inspiring heated debate around the world on the subject. Obama believes that precision medicine is a necessary path for the world’s biomedical engineering industry, Lee said.
The goal of precision medicine is to seek more precise diagnosis methods and more effective drugs, and match them to develop the most economic and efficient medical therapies based on an individuals needs, Lee said.
Because different ethnic groups are endowed with different gene types, precision medicine is an industry that has different forms and needs in different areas.
“This will be the advantage of Taiwan’s biotech industry,” Lee said.
He said he hoped that the conference would help the nation gain a competitive position and find its direction for future development in the Asia-Pacific market.
Taiwan is to receive the first batch of Lockheed Martin F-16 Block 70 jets from the US late this month, a defense official said yesterday, after a year-long delay due to a logjam in US arms deliveries. Completing the NT$247.2 billion (US$7.69 billion) arms deal for 66 jets would make Taiwan the third nation in the world to receive factory-fresh advanced fighter jets of the same make and model, following Bahrain and Slovakia, the official said on condition of anonymity. F-16 Block 70/72 are newly manufactured F-16 jets built by Lockheed Martin to the standards of the F-16V upgrade package. Republic of China
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