Nobel Prize-winning molecular biologist Phillip Sharp knows that even the best science can’t stand alone. Bringing life-changing products to market also requires a keen sense of business.
Speaking at Bentley through the Innovator’s Business Series, he stressed the need for “individuals who have a strong vision and a deep understanding of business, and relationships and management, to make a company successful.”
The lesson was hard won for Sharp, who cofounded biotech company Biogen in 1978. Collaboration between science and industry was not accepted practice — and the firm’s initial structure reflected the disconnect.
“The biotech field had developed in the absence of engagement with private sector activity,” recounts Sharp, who holds the highest rank of Institute Professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “Scientists didn’t trust the business side and the company was highly focused on development of the science.”
Things changed when Biogen hired a CEO with a strong business background who actively listened to company scientists.
Some 200 Bentley alumni have worked for companies founded by Nobel Prize-winning scientist Phillip Sharp.
“When it came to making decisions, he had the confidence of the scientists,” says Sharp. “Business leaders in the high-tech industry have to understand something about the technology and science. They don’t have to be in the weeds, but they have to know what the weeds are.”
Today, Biogen is a multinational, multi-billion dollar Fortune 100 company. Sharp went on to cofound Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, which develops products based on a breakthrough in understanding how genes work in cells.
“Educating business leaders in the broad sector about the technology, and engaging scientists who are developing the technology in business objectives — that is how you translate these ideas into being useful.”