Genomic data access patterns as indicators of the diffusion of science and technology capability

Over the past decade, hundreds of labs spent billions of dollars to generate terabytes of genetic sequence data. These tidal waves of information have been deposited into some of the largest 'libraries' ever constructed. While debate has raged about the social and ethical implications of the genomics revolution, surprisingly little attention has focused on the data themselves: who is using these genomic data and for what purposes? We recently had the opportunity to investigate these questions, and came to some surprising conclusions. At the Harvard Business School Life Sciences Project, we are trying to understand the industrial dynamics of what has been termed the life sciences revolution, its impact on firms, regions, and nations. How will economies and organizations be transformed, who will succeed, and what will it take to do so? A first step in our project is an attempt to estimate which nations and regions are winning - and which failing - in the race to construct the scientific and technologies capabilities needed to participate in the biotechonomy of the future.