March - 2001 - issue > Career Wize

The year is 2100. Bioengineering has stepped out of the lab and into boutique shops — customizing who you are and what you look like — replacing the beauty salon as we know it today; but if merely cosmetic changes are not your thing, you can go for more fundamental stuff: Not athletic enough, change that; not tall enough, alter that; mathematical aptitude is lacking, that too can be easily fixed ... if, that is, you have not already been “engineered” to be born perfect -- free from disease and free from deformity. The average life expentancy is two hundred years or older. At the first sign of disease, people shop around for a better and stronger “organically grown” heart or brain or kidney, as the case may be. Maybe the term “mortality,” or perhaps even “life,” has been redefined in the absence of death.


No, this is not the script for a science fiction movie. Truth, they say, is stranger than fiction. If experts are to be believed, movies like Gattica and Bicentennial Man may not be an abstract vision out of someone’s fantastic imagination, but very close-to-truth scenarios, in perhaps a 100 or a 150 years. In the last decade, with the mapping of the human genome alone, life science research has made tremendous strides. Those seemed the ‘stuff of sci-fi movies’ have now become the realistic targets of many pharmaceutical firms. World over research is underway to isolate every single gene that can offer a clue into the mysteries of human existence, and the pieces are just beginning to fall into place.


“Even discounting the hype that surrounds this area of science, the truth is that mankind is actually on the threshold of some rather startling revelations and breakthroughs. Some of the results will start becoming apparent even in our own lifetime,” says Sunil Erraballi, CEO of Frontier Technology Inc., a company that provides consulting and staffing services for life sciences companies in the San Francisco Bay area.

Technology Fuels Research
Technology is integral to this change. If we look closely, it is the marriage of life sciences with information technology that has been the driver of these momentous leaps in genetic research.

The Scope for Innovation
Along with these advancements in Biotechnology and bioinfomatics, there has emerged a new need for skilled, trained professionals who can handle the complexity of this evolving branch of life sciences. “But, it is not a job for everyone. It is a job for innovators, for people who see things differently, who are ready to lead the way in absence of established prototypes and norms. People who can think beyond specs and code, and shoot straight for solutions,” cautions Mohan Iyer, vice president of R&D operations and business development at diaDeXus, a genomics company dedicated to the discovery and development of novel genomic biomarkers for the detection and treatment of disease.


The need of the industry seems to be technology pioneers and leaders, whose footprints will set the paradigms for the future.

Technology Weds Biology
Even though biotechnology has traditionally been a research-dominated area the demarcation of where technology ends and research starts is rapidly being obliterated, creating a number of jobs for technologists within the wide umbrella of life sciences. Discussed below are rough categorizations of possible options.

Data Management Jobs:
Data management means a couple of things in terms of IT manpower needs. The advancement in the biotech industry are creates an enormous amount of biological data — which hold the key to future medical breakthroughs, cures and revolutionary drugs. However, pharmaceutical companies lack the resources, know-how and expertise to mine the data — which demand technical expertise, new software applications and innovative platforms. For instance, successful companies like Incyte Genomics and Celera Genomics have many gene-sequencing instruments that interpret and analyze nucleotide after nucleotide around the clock — information that pharmaceutical companies are ready to pay top dollars for. The problem? There are three billion nucleotides in the human genome alone — an amount of data that threatens to overwhelm researchers. This deluge of information has necessitated the careful storage, organization and indexing of genomic information, creating need for extensive data management.


In short, bioinformatics, or the task of managing the huge amount of biological data generated by researchers is currently one of the critical needs of the industry. The knowledge base needed for most of these jobs includes molecular biology, programming, mathematics and statistics.


Managing and creating systems that can be used by companies to carry on research and development are also hot fields. As the field grows and develops, the need for related applications and instrumentation will also increase. “New technology for large-scale detection, and estimation of sub-microgram quantities of biomolecules on electronic chips are being developed and in some cases already developed and need to be optimized,” says Venugopal Janapati, senior software engineer, Space Operations Contract. But, he adds, “the current number of jobs in this area are still very limited. The technology is still not completely out of the research labs.” When it comes out there will be an increase in the jobs for professionals with knowledge of some molecular biology, chemistry and electronics. Other major advances have occurred in high-throughput screening where robotic techniques are eliminating the need for manpower to physically conduct experiments. As an example, it once took researchers six months for 50,000 assays, and now the same job can be done in a matter of days.

Infrastructure Jobs
These are the traditional IT jobs that all enterprises need, life sciences or otherwise. An IT professional or an engineer could be part of either the MIS department or part of the product development group. Salaries are comparable and an advanced postgraduate degree is not required. In product development, where specific applications are developed for the life sciences companies, the requirements are for advanced degrees in specific areas of expertise in software, firmware and hardware functions utilized for developing products. Other opportunities are in areas of quality assurance, testing and process analysis, etc.


In addition, off-the-shelf ERP software packages such as SAP, Oracle Applications and BAAN are not tailored for pharmaceutical/life sciences companies. In the absence of custom software, most companies are developing homegrown software to meet their specific needs. Venture-backed startups like DoubleTwist, a Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers funded company, and NetGenics are eyeing this huge sector greedily.


Erraballi says that some of the in-demand skills are PERL, ORACLE, PL/SQL, C, JAVA, EJB, Weblogic application servers, data modeling, object modeling, system analysis, and design and project management.

What Does it Take?
Aptitude and the ability to grasp information outside of pure technology are critical for success. One’s expertise and domain knowledge has to extend beyond IT principles. Even though many computer scientists and engineers in life sciences start with little or no knowledge of life sciences or biology per se, they are expected to acquire it as they go along. “Good software engineering skills with interest in life sciences is essential,” Erraballi tells us, “The ideal candidate would have a balanced computer sciences and biology background. Trained professionals are still the need of the industry.”


This is an industry that has traditionally groomed people for its special needs. “Many universities see the challenge the industry is facing in terms of trained manpower and are now beginning programs to train people specifically for bioinformatic jobs,” states Larry Setren of Setren, Smallberg & Associates, a leading placement company in the field. “In the absence of structured courses to train people, people learn and acquire specific skills that are applicable on the job. The faster you learn, the faster your growth path. As a person gets more experience, he will find others ready to hire him more readily.”

Rewards and Salary
Industry insiders tell us that salary is a function of education and experience, but most engineers and programmers start at roughly the same figures as professionals in pure IT companies. The salary can range from $50,000 to $70,000 for entry-level jobs. Stock options are an added attraction for people who join hot startups in the field. Once people have paid their dues to career and industry, they can generally make somewhere in the six-figure range. The trend in compensation has been favorable on the whole — salaries have been climbing over the years to keep pace with the high-tech sector.


So what is it that attracts people to this rather esoteric profession? Iyer points out, “Most professionals I know did not join for financial or material rewards. The motivation very often is good ol’ altruism. It is the same reason why people want to become doctors.” Iyer adds passionately, “There has to be a desire to change the world. It is an area that is calling out for people who want to do something different ... who do not want to confine themselves to an ordinary existence.” Which brings us to the next logical crossroad: How would an engineer’s life be different in a pure-play technology company vs. in a life sciences environment?


“Very, different. You will be ‘one-of-many’ in any technology company. Except in a really large pharmaceutical firm, in most small biotechnology companies, you will be ‘one-of-one’ with unique job responsibilities. Your peers will not be other programmers as in an IBM or a Cisco but researchers who will rely on you to lead the way,” Iyer explains. However, on the flip side is the fact that you will probably not have the support mechanisms of a tech company to fall back on, which can make it challenging for many people.

The Crystal Ball Says
Opportunities for IT professionals in life sciences will keep growing, as technology and life sciences become inseparable entities. Even today most of the projects in life sciences are so intrinsically based on technology that the career boom is going to continue. A clear indication of this trend is that many mainstream companies are making huge investments in biotechnology and life sciences. “For all we know in future the distinction between life sciences and technology will be so narrow that all pure technology plays will have a life sciences or bioinformatic arm in future,” says Stern, “Companies like IBM, Agilent and Motorola that are on top of the trends are investing heavily in developing their expertise in this virgin area.” Maybe in the future, as the distinction between technology and life sciences fades further, there will be no telling the two apart.