Biotechnology industry resources

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This guide lists selected print and online information sources available to SFU researchers. If you do not find what you need, contact Mark Bodnar, mbodnar@sfu.ca, the Liaison Librarian for Business.

The biotechnology field is full of new terms and concepts that you really have to understand to properly study the industry. The first two sections of this guide (overview and current awareness) contain resources to help you understand the jargon and to provide the most current view of the industry.

Overviews

General

BIOTECanada
See the sub-section on Bio-economy for a high-level view

What is Biotechnology?
Biotechnology Industry Association

Principles of Biomedical Sciences and Industry: Translating Ideas into Treatments
Ebook (2022): "covers the entire product lifecycle, from translating a scientific idea into a prototype to product development, launch, and management."

More? - Google search for "what is biotechnology"

Focused on the industry

Biotech Business
from The Balance - some basic articles aimed at educating investors

Deloitte: Life Sciences
Search their site for more reports and articles - you may have to register (free) to view some documents

Ernst & Young: Scan the Life Sciences part of the E&Y site

Industry Handbook: Biotechnology
From Investopedia.com

Plunkett's Biotech, Pharmaceuticals & Genetics Industry Almanac 2024
Biotech & genetics industry market research, statistics, trends & leading companies. See also the Health Care Industry Almanac by the same publisher.

More? - Check out the governments & associations sections below as well as our separate Industry Surveys guide

Learn about the local industry with the annual Life Sciences magazine from BiV (Business in Vancouver).

Cover image of the 2024 edition of Life Sciences from Business in Vancouver. Click to access that issue.

Definitions

BIO's Glossaries: Glossary of Biotechnology Regulation and Compliance Terminology & Glossary of Agricultural Biotechnology Terms

Also try searching our catalogue using the subject Biotechnology - Dictionaries 

General business dictionaries: See the Dictionaries section of the SFU Library's guide to Business Writing for many online and print business dictionaries

Current awareness (news sources)

News sources that you can easily check frequently to keep on top of this rapidly changing field:

Note that many of the relevant journals and magazines available online for SFU researchers have "alert" features that allow you to get emails when new issues are published or your chosen topics are reported on. See section 4.4 (Electronic Journals) of this guide for tips on finding relevant e-journals.

Articles and reports

Business Source Complete is most likely to be the first article database that you should try, but the other resources on the following lists may also be useful. Ask for assistance if you can't find what you need in these databases.

Business/marketing/investment perspective

Business Source Complete (BSC)
Uses SUBJECTS such as Biotechnology industries, Genetic engineering industry, and Pharmaceutical biotechnology industry. More tips for this database:

  • BSC includes the full-text of such journals/magazines as Biotech Business, Biotech Financial Reports, Worldwide Biotech, and the Journal of Commercial Biotechnology
  • Note that Business Source Complete also offers some MedTrack and MarketLine company profiles for major companies around the world. Click on the More > Company Profiles button at the top of the screen in the database and search for your company
  • BSC also has thousands of industry and market reports, many of which touch on biotech topics. From the main search screen, check the box next to the Document Type "Industry Overviews" to focus your search on such reports

Argus Industry Review & Outlook via S&P Capital IQ
The Argus report series includes reports on industries such as Biotechnology, Medical Technology, and Pharmaceuticals. To find these reports within S&P Capital IQ, click on Research, then search for Argus Research Group in the Contributor field and Argus Industry Review in the Keyword field. Be sure to select the option to "Search Headline Only" for the Keyword field. See this screen capture for a visual of what your search should look like.

DelveInsight Business Research via Factiva
DelveInsight is a healthcare business consulting and market research company providing expert analysis focused mainly in the pharmaceutical and biotech sectors. The PDF research reports offer key insights into research and development, strategy formulation, operations, competitive intelligence and landscape, and mergers and acquisitions within these industries. (Click on Modify Search and add terms in the search box to focus on specific products or conditions.
[This resource is also available via our Nexis Uni database.]

  Use with caution: As relevant as market research reports from firms such as DelveInsight might look, they generally do not provide the details you need to adequately evaluate them: the specific sources and methodology behind their analysis, as well as the industry-specific expertise and experience of their analysts. 

It's very common to find widely varying product sales forecasts from different research firms, yet each forecast may seem dependable and professional on the surface. At best, you should consider such forecasts to be rough estimates, ones that you will need to back up with additional research from a wide variety of sources.

IBISWorld
Analysis of US, Canada, China and global industries providing insight into current and future industry performance, changing trends, operating conditions and supply chain linkages. Covers dozens of industries in the Life Science field such as Medical Instrument & Supply Manufacturing in Canada.

Nexis Uni (formerly LexisNexis)
Has many full-text trade publications that deal with this topic. Start by adding some or all of these sources to a search filter. 

Factiva
Global business and industry news from over 33,000 publications, including the Wall Street Journal. Factiva also includes some research report sources such as DelveInsight (mentioned elsewhere in this guide), The Insight Partners Research, and The Business Research Company. 
Key biotech industry news publications to watch for within Factiva: 

S&P Capital IQ
The Research option within this database includes reports from a broad range of investment analysis firms. A few of those contributors focus on companies in the biotech/medtech area or offer broad industry reports that encompass that sector. Argus Industry Review & Outlooks reports, mentioned elsewhere in this guide, are one such example. Here are a few others: 

  • CFRA Equity Research (includes Industry Overview reports on Pharmaceuticals, Biotechnology, Health Care Technology, and Life Sciences Tools & Services, as well as company-specific equity analysis)
  • goetzpartners securities Limited
  • NOBLE Capital Markets, Inc.
  • PartnerCap Securities, LLC
  • Redeye (focus on Sweden)
  • Trinity Delta Research Limited (UK focus)

Check our lists of business databases for additional suggestions.

Science perspective (including biology, medicine, and computing)

Remember to include terms such as industry, business, or commerce in your searches to focus on the business aspects of the topic or you will be buried in scientific articles.

Multidisciplinary perspective

Key journals

The SFU Library provides hundreds of journals & magazines that touch on biotechnology, most of which are available online for all current SFU researchers. For examples, see such titles as... Biotechnology & bioengineering, Biotechnology progress, and Biotechnology advances, as well as such magazines as Biotech Financial Reports.

Start by scanning the recent issues of some of the Nature Reviews titles owned by SFU. For example...

Books

Books often provide a deeper and broader treatment of a subject than you can get from either a journal article or a web site. Start your search in the SFU Library Catalogue with the following subjects:

Company information

Note that some of the resources listed in the Current Awareness section of this guide will give you recent company news/press releases. In addition, the databases listed in the Articles and Reports section are likely to provide company-specific information. The resources below are for more detailed financial information about companies - primarily of publicly-traded companies.

Key databases (largely financial data)

Directories

More detailed SFU Library guides for company information

Associations and industry organizations

Associations and industry organizations often have publications, news, and links to further resources. The following are a few of the many associations and organizations associated with biotechnology. 

Government information

Governments at all levels can be great sources of useful data and analysis. 

Metro Vancouver

British Columbia

Canada

United States

International

Web guides & directories

These sites have been chosen because they have extensive links to biotechnology information. They are good places to start searching if the resources in this guide don't have what you need.

Bioethics

Web sites

Journals

Start by searching the indexes listed in the Articles & Reports section above. The following list of journals is among the many potentially relevant titles that are online for SFU researchers.

Books

Start your search in our catalogue with such subject headings as:

Patents

The following guides to patent research are great starting points: