PharmaMar, a leading biopharmaceutical company of the Zeltia Group, searches the sea bed for new compounds which are then tested for their ability to combat tumor growth.

hanks to institutional support and dogged resolution, Zeltia began finding marine compounds, soon becoming a star performer on the Madrid stock exchange.

Private investment in biomedical research in Spain grew 32 percent in 2007, and according to trade promotion agency ICEX, the domestic biomedical industry has expanded by 350 percent since 2003. More than 270 public institutions are currently involved in R&D, with 92,500 professionals working in the labs and contributing to science journals. More than 2,000 Spanish students are awarded PhDs in biotechnology each year.

The growth reflects new approaches to industrial development by the country’s regional governments, as well as Spain’s excellent medical infrastructure. For example, the Basque Country, with its long engineering tradition, has now established a strong presence in the field of bio-robotics. In Madrid, science parks have been adept at channeling money from financial markets to bio-incubators. Barcelona, which has a well-established pharmaceuticals sector, opened a stunning waterfront center in May 2006 for research into gene regulation and cell biology. It is also the first domestic lab to experiment with embryonic stem cells.

For Zeltia, all this growing competition is good news. By 2007, the company had obtained a credit line of €50 million ($73 million) from lenders such as the European Investment Bank.

Listed on the Spanish stock exchange since 1998, its financial assets had grown to €67 million ($98 million) by mid-2007. Meanwhile, the European Commission has recently ratified the cancer-fighting compound known as Yondelis, developed by Zeltia subsidiary PharmaMar.

In 2008, Zeltia will apply to launch Yondelis in the United States. The Food and Drug Administration has already designated its use for the treatment of soft-tissue sarcoma.