“Strategy is nothing more than a commitment to a set of coherent, mutually reinforcing policies aimed at achieving a specific competitive goal.” - Gary Pisano

“Strategy is about making choices, trade-offs. It’s about deliberately choosing to be different.” - Michael Porter

Biostrategy confers the ability to incorporate biology or biotechnology into a business, to survive and thrive under rapidly changing conditions. Biostrategy begins as an idea, is expressed in words, then gets translated into actions.

Biostrategy offers the solution to problems that can be uniquely solved with biology. It is the plans that will help you execute against your objectives and achieve your goals.

Innovation is a mantra across all industries. Biostrategy expands the innovation toolkit with biology.

Biostrategy is the framework for incorporating biology into your business.

Your biostrategy will guide your use and successful implementation of biotechnology without the need to chase the latest technological fad or be distracted by today’s hottest innovation. It’s a strategic differentiator that examines internal processes and leverages existing market data to create a competitive advantage. Biostrategy should inspire the people in your organization to get excited about the application of biology to solve business-related problems, get them involved in the process, and give them specific goals that will make the strategy work.

Paul Freemont of Imperial College London commented that most big companies do not understand how quickly small companies are innovating, and this should serve as motivation for companies large and small. He also said, “Synthetic biology can have its greatest impact on consumer products that people use every day.”

The Biostrategy Canvas gives you a starting point to develop a biostrategy that fits into your existing business strategy or innovation strategy to match your specific competitive needs.

“Victorious warriors win first, then go to war while defeated warriors go to war, then seek to win.” - Sun Tzu

For most companies, biostrategy starts with a list of projects or products that are prioritized based on the potential impact of biology. From there, you can start brainstorming where to create a biostrategy from first to last.

Canvas downloadable in PDF and PowerPoint formats.

Design Your Bio Strategy in One Day

You can create your biostrategy in one day if you approach the creation of the canvas systematically and define next steps immediately. Here are the questions you’ll need to answer:

Problem: What is a problem we are having that can be uniquely solved with biology? Where could biotechnology create 10x growth for us?

Importance: Why does solving this problem matter now?

Vision: How would biology solve this problem? Are there any waste streams we can use as resources?

Value Proposition: How will we create value with biology? What value will we deliver to our customers? Which customer problems are we helping solve?

Business Model: For what value are our customers willing to pay? How can we monetize the use of biology to solve this problem? Are there multiple revenue streams to be defined?

Chief Biology Officer: Who has the scientific knowledge to lead this effort? What key resources do our value propositions need?

Biology as a Service: Is it possible for us to partner? To outsource? With who?

Challenges: What or who will prevent our progress?

Stakeholders: Who needs to change to realize our vision?

Internal/External Story: Who do we involve internally in the implementation of our biostrategy? What story will we tell the world? How do we currently reach our customer segments? What channels work best?

The Plan: What will we do immediately after defining your bio strategy? What progress we we have made toward your goal in three months? In twelve months, what results do we want to see?

Biostrategy is accessible and necessary for all companies. If you need help with yours, click here to contact us.

UPDATED: 1.15.2022

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