Gov. Josh Shapiro visited a University City life sciences incubator on Tuesday to celebrate a new $125 million fund aimed at boosting Pennsylvania’s life sciences industry.
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The funding — approved in the $50.8 billion state budget deal reached earlier this month — will go toward developing new talent pipelines, help offset the cost of clinical trials, and expand access to venture-capital funding.
While Philadelphia has historically trailed other metropolitan areas like Boston and San Francisco in attracting life sciences investments — including in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical fields — lawmakers and industry leaders said they hope the new funding will help close the gap. The money will be available for projects across the state.
“I think you can feel the momentum building all across our commonwealth in the life sciences space,” said Shapiro, who was joined at the B+labs space by industry leaders and Democratic state lawmakers. “After really not being on the field of competition in the life sciences space for years and years and years, Pennsylvania is not just competing again. Pennsylvania is winning.”
The new funding comes as some of the nation’s largest life sciences companies have announced their plans to invest billions in Pennsylvania, an accomplishment touted by Shapiro’s administration.
Johnson & Johnson announced this spring its plans to build a $1 billion cell therapy plant in Montgomery County. And pharmaceutical giant Lilly is expected to break ground on a $3.5 billion manufacturing facility in the Lehigh Valley, set to be fully operational in 2031.
Shapiro on Tuesday noted Pennsylvania’s potential to be a national hub for the life sciences industry, given the state’s robust research universities, adding that more than 100,000 Pennsylvanians work in the sector.
The $125 million investment is the state’s most significant in almost three decades and is a “true differentiator,” said Chris Molineaux, the CEO of the trade group Life Sciences Pennsylvania. Last year, Shapiro called for Harrisburg to invest $30 million in life sciences funding, but the money was not allocated in the final state budget.
Of the nearly 1,000 businesses in his organization, Molineaux said that more than 400 are small startups with fewer than 10 employees, and will benefit from the additional dollars. A vibrant startup landscape in Pennsylvania, he added, means there is plenty of innovation, but also competition for limited funding.
“Entrepreneurialism is alive and well in Pennsylvania,” Molineaux said. “But it’s also an extremely fragile community that needs the kind of public policy support, the nurturing, and the financial support.”
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Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia CEO Madeline Bell told the crowd the story of a baby whose rare metabolic disorder was treated by the hospital’s doctors with a first-of-its-kind custom gene-editing therapy. That type of innovative treatment is made possible through outside funding and support from lawmakers, Bell said, stressing the importance of the state’s new investment.
“It’s going to make our breakthroughs possible, it is going to get them from the bench to the bedside more quickly,” said Bell.
The state will finance the program through the sale of insurance premiums tax credits to insurance companies.
Shapiro said the funding is expected to become available in a few weeks and will be disbursed through an application managed by the Department of Community and Economic Development.
The program is also structured to prioritize projects that address needs specific to Pennsylvania, according to literature provided by the state, and will support projects developed by companies founded by people in historically underrepresented groups that have not always had access to funding.
“Part of this funding will go to make sure that folks who historically did not get invested, get invested,” said Democratic State Sen. Vincent Hughes, who represents West Philadelphia. “That communities not too far away from here, blocks away from here, get the opportunity to allow their young people and their genius to be realized.”
The program — named Innovate in PA 2.0 — builds on the 2013 Innovate in PA initiative signed into law by then Republican Gov. Tom Corbett, which offered $100 million in seed funding to technology startups.
“Innovators, we believe in you, this state believes in you,” Hughes said. “There is a group of people in this commonwealth of Pennsylvania who believe in you, will continue to invest in you, and want to make sure that your dreams of saving lives turn into reality.”