HONG KONG – Recent investments by global life sciences companies in Seoul underscores the newfound emphasis that South Korea is putting on the development of biotechnology as a key emerging industry.

Life Technologies Corp. (NASDAQ:LIFE), of Carlsbad, Calif., has made South Korea one of its top five investment destinations this year.

“We predict strong growth in the South Korean market in the coming years,” said Atsuko Igawa, head of public relations at Life Technologies in an interview with BioWorld Asia. “We want to be able to match its growth in the future.”

The company plans to open an office in the upscale Gangnam district of Seoul. Earlier this year, it acquired two life science distributors in South Korea. One is reagents distributor KDR Biotech Co., based in Seoul, which the company acquired in an April deal. In June, Life Technologies acquired instruments distributor Life Science Korea (LSK). The new office in Seoul will bring the two new acquisitions together and act as a South Korean service hub for Life Technologies.

“This facility is a testimony to Life Technologies’ strong commitment to contribute to the growth of the life science and biotech industries,” said Joydeep Goswami, president of Life Technologies, Asia Pacific and Japan. “We are delighted to strengthen our capabilities in this important market and serve as a trusted partner with our empowered go-direct service and widened portfolio.”

South Korea has been experiencing a biotech boom over the last half decade, part of a concerted effort to become a global biotech leader. Strong government support, growing collaboration between multinational and domestic companies and an increasing number of clinical trials could allow South Korea to become a prime investment location in Asia for biotechnology companies.

Since it released its decade-long Second Framework Plan for Biotechnology Promotion (Bio-Vision 2016) in 2006, South Korea has focused on the biotech industry with the goal of becoming a top player. Bio-Vision 2006 replaced Biotech 2000, an earlier plan that failed after South Korea’s largest conglomerates known as “chaebols” like Samsung Biologics, of Seoul, or Hyundai lost interest due to low profitability and the government withdrew funding. Having learned from that failed effort, the new policy is based on bioconvergence, integrating a number of disciplines like biology, bioinformatics and nanotechnology while creating bioclusters that bring all these factors together.

The South Korean government now says biotech is one of the most important areas of focus for the country’s future economic development. It is looking to boost investment and adjust the regulatory environment to give the bio-economy a boost.

Like several other countries in Asia, South Korea is looking to generate new healthcare options as it deals with an aging population. The country is technically an aging society since the year 2000. By 2016, a very large proportion of the aging population will be in need of good medical services and advanced biotechnologies.

According to the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety (formerly known as the Korean Food and Drug Administration), eight out of the top 10 healthcare exports are biopharmaceutical products.

There are 417 biotech companies in South Korea according to Biotech Gate, a database owned by Swiss valuation service provider Venture Valuation and as many as 46 of these companies focus on biotechnology research and development while many others are service providers. Most of the biotechs in the country are located in or near Seoul, the capital.

The South Korean government also is putting a fair amount of emphasis in the research and development of biosimilars, according to BioWorld’s report, The Biosimilars Game: A Scorecard for Opportunities, Threats and Critical Strategies. By 2020, South Korea predicts that biosimilars made in that country will account for more than one-fifth of the global market.

The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety put forward regulatory guidelines for biosimilars in 2009, the same year that the government put in place an $80 million fund to assist local biotech companies research and develop biosimilars.