Biotechnology is a booming industry in coastal hotspots like Biotech Bay, Biotech Beach and Biohub Boston. But there may be a new contender: landlocked Ohio.
In 2023, Columbus and Cincinnati topped a list of emerging U.S. life science hubs compiled by CBRE, a global commercial real estate firm. The only two cities on the list from the same state, they received over $560 million combined from the National Institutes of Health in 2022. In 2024, Ohio received $1 billion in NIH funding.
Biotechnology broadly refers to the use of life processes to develop products that improve human health, commonly in the form of drugs. Some examples of well-known biotech innovations include CRISPR-Cas9 genome editing, manufactured insulin and mRNA-based vaccines.
While the U.S. biotech industry has historically been situated primarily on the coasts, it is gradually expanding to states beyond California and Massachusetts.
“I’m amazed [by] what’s happening around here in terms of biotech in Columbus in the last five to 10 years,” Jeffrey Chalmers, a chemical and biomolecular engineering professor of over 30 years at The Ohio State University, said. “There wasn’t any of it going on in Ohio when I came here.”
Chalmers credited this trend to a mixture of individual company preferences, nearby universities and state support. For his own work, Chalmers has recently been able to collaborate with local companies instead of flying out of state.
One local company, Forge Biologics, was founded in 2020 in Grove City, a suburb of Columbus. Forge is primarily involved in making a form of gene therapy targeted to individuals with genetic disorders.
According to Hannah Munizza, vice president of marketing at Forge Biologics, the company chose Grove City due to lower construction costs, the talent pool from nearby universities and the convenience of the location. The cofounders also have connections to Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, a research institution that has helped make the city a hub for gene therapy.
“What makes for really rich, robust industries is when people want to build and create and innovate. And then all of the tangential results are other great scientists spinning out their own companies and having this really robust industry to pull from,” Munizza said. “It’s important not just to have one success, but multiple, so that there’s a talent pool and support.”
Ohio’s relatively recent breakout as a biotech hub can be partially attributed to the long lifetime of drug development, Munizza said. Gene therapy has been around for about 50 years, but some places are only now producing results after decades of investment.
Initiatives throughout Ohio encourage the biotech ecosystem to keep growing. An example within Forge is the She Forges program, which is designed to elevate women into positions of leadership in the biotech industry and maintain Forge’s 50% female workforce. The program involves hosting community outreach, networking and recruitment events for women within the company and beyond.
Another program is the Biotechnology Bootcamp hosted by Columbus State Community College. This 12-week crash course in Good Manufacturing Practices prepares students for entry-level technical biotech roles.
“There’s a bunch of companies in Columbus that need that type of employee,” Munizza said. “It was just such a great way for our community to come together and partner with a local … community college to come up with this program.”
Along with a talent pool to pull from, biotech startups need capital investments to get off the ground. Scott Jacobs, executive director of Queen City Angels, a Cincinnati-based investment group, said getting this money is one of the biggest hurdles companies face.
“We have all the players. We all have the technology. We have the suppliers. It’s just a matter of getting more investment capital to be able to drive the development of some of the technologies,” Jacobs said, naming the innovation coming out of Ohio universities as another driver of momentum. “We have all the ingredients. We’re just a little bit more quiet about it here in the Midwest, so we may show success, but we don’t brag about it as much as we probably should.”
To counter this humility, trade groups like Ohio Life Sciences have become public advocates for Ohio’s life sciences industry. OLS rebranded from BioOhio in 2022, expanding the mission of the then-35-year-old association. The organization is involved in multiple statewide education initiatives to increase awareness of the life sciences, such as a Learning Lunchbox program that gives students kits with hands-on activities related to life science industry careers in order to teach them and their families about the field.
“We’ve had to spend quite a bit of time in the state, just informing the average individual of what [biotech] means for life science,” Angela McMurry, Director of Industry Engagement & Workforce at OLS, said. “And we try to tell them, ‘This is about saving lives, this is about improving our livelihood down the road.’”
OLS also partnered with JobsOhio to create the Ohio Discovery Corridor, a network that connects Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati to encourage STEM talent and job development. Up-and-coming companies can get help with everything from funding to finding talent. This is only a starting point — cities beyond the corridor, like Springfield and Bowling Green, are worth highlighting as well, McMurry said.
According to McMurry, one of Ohio’s challenges is competing with states with well-established biotech industries. This incumbency advantage helps attract financial supporters that might not be aware of the workforce and potential of a place like Ohio.
“We can do a better job of telling that story, because once we tell that story and show the data that goes along with it, then I think that the money and the financing comes along with it,” McMurry said. “And I think just truly coming here and seeing the opportunity that exists, I think that’s huge. It’s getting them in the door, so to speak.”
While popular perception slowly catches onto Ohio’s relevance in the biotech sphere, academics and industry professionals are already reaping the benefits.
“You just kind of sit back and go, ‘Gee, wow, this is nice. I don’t have to get on a plane and fly across the coast to see what’s going on,’” Chalmers said.
