It was a tough month for biopharmaceutical companies as a combination of clinical trial failures and drug pricing rhetoric ramping up in Washington kept investors sitting on their hands. As a result, the BioWorld Biopharmaceutical Index fell more than 6 percent in value, underperforming the generals markets, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average closing March just below water and the Nasdaq Composite index recording an almost 2 percent gain in the same period.

The top 100 public biopharmaceutical companies ranked by market cap, excluding big pharma companies, continued to ramp up their research and development investments last year, according to an analysis conducted by BioWorld Insight.