Few companies in the Valley fall into the biotech domain, but the ones who do have a huge economic impact on the community. By some estimates, the biotech industry supplies nearly 9,000 jobs in the area. Amgen spokeswoman Sarah Rockwell said that the Thousand Oaks-based company employs 6,800 people. And Thousand Oaks Economic Development manager Gary Wartik says that the biotech giant provides an additional 400 contract jobs. Moreover, Baxter Bioscience, part of Baxter Pharmaceuticals, employs about 1,100, according to Wartik, while a smaller biotech company named Ceres employs about 160. Factor into those figures the amount of miscellaneous companies founded in recent years by former Amgen employees who decided to strike out on their own, and you have about 9,000 jobs total, Wartik said. Amgen refused to disclose the average salary of its employees, but Business Journal sources estimated that the mean yearly pay is at least six figures. Mark Schniepp, director of the Santa Barbara-based California Economic Forecast, believes that the average salary of employees at Amgen and other biotech companies is over $100,000. And he believes that even that number is a conservative estimate. “Biotech tends to be very high paying,” he said. That’s why Schniepp felt it was important to point out that the non-scientists of the biotech company employee pool, such as receptionists and janitors, bring the average salary down. “Some of the top scientific people are getting $150,000 to $200,000,” he said. Whatever the exact figure is, Schniepp said that it affects the base salary for all employees in Conejo Valley and surrounding areas. “There are years when they pay a big bonus,” he said. “It really impacts the average salary, and there’s no doubt, if Amgen and Baxter weren’t there, the average salary in the county would be lower. They raise the average salary.” Wartik speculated that, if the average income of local biotech employees is $125,000, “We’re looking at $109 million dollars just in salaries,” he said. “That number is probably double if you use a multiplier factor of approximately five. That tells you how many times the dollar is generated through that time, circulated in that community. That pre-supposes everyone in those jobs works in Thousand Oaks. We know that’s not true, but they live generally between Camarillo and Calabasas, with a small number in Simi Valley and Agoura Park, so east Ventura County and Western Los Angeles County.” In this area alone, hundreds of millions of dollars are generated by biotech, Wartik said. Amgen generated $14.5 billion in worldwide sales in 2007, Wartik went on. While the company no longer does much manufacturing in Thousand Oaks, the City benefits because it is still the heart of Amgen’s management and research and development work. “They do create a lot of additional businesses,” Bill Watkins, executive director of the University of California, Santa Barbara, Economic Forecast, said of Amgen. “Employees spend their money here, and that’s one reason Thousand Oaks has had, over time, strong retail sales. There’s a certain impact on house prices. They obviously add a lot to the gross product.” Support services The company also generates a large amount of needs for support services, Watkins asserted. Because of how spectacular Amgen’s campus is alone, he said, Amgen has created countless construction jobs over the years. “It’s a key component of the Conejo Valley economy,” Watkins said. “It would be a completely different place without it. They are the 800-pound gorilla. Biotech certainly has a huge impact on the people of Thousand Oaks,” Schniepp and Wartik agreed. “They can accommodate the kind of housing that’s in the area as well as very important economic sectors,” Schniepp said. Wartik called biotech significant, both in current jobs and growth potential. Even former Amgen employees play a role in giving the community an economic boost, he feels. “We have in Thousand Oaks, hundreds of former Amgen employees who are part of our community,” he said. “Their children go to our schools. The former employees shop here. They have homes and are looking to stay in this community, so people are looking for opportunities to form a business, to contribute to the life and sciences industry and make a good living.” Wartik cited attorney Brent Reinke, co-founder of The Biotech Forum, an organization formed to facilitate the development and growth of a biotech cluster in the 101 Corridor, as playing a major role in unifying those who seek to expand the biotechnology and life science field in the Thousand Oaks vicinity. He’s also identified people who are willing to help fund and invest in that process, Wartik said. Rallying the community around the industry is crucial because biotech affects everything here, according to Reinke. “From retail to home prices to everything else,” he said. “Partly, why there’s such a strong interest to try to facilitate the development of additional bioscience (companies) is because of the economic impact.” But Reinke also feels that the skills of biotech employees many of whom have advanced degrees in biology, chemistry, the life sciences and mathematics and were brought in to deal with the Food and Drug Administration and other government agencies have skill sets that may benefit other industries. Because of this, Reinke even has a positive outlook on the employees laid off by Amgen last fall. “Maybe an increase in the labor pool might be helpful to other businesses,” he said. “There are companies that might benefit that aren’t strictly biotech. They have needs that can be fulfilled from people coming out of Amgen, (whose) biotech backgrounds can probably overlap into other areas, too.” Bill Burrato, president and CEO of the Ventura County Economic Development Association, felt similarly to Reinke about the importance of the local biotech cluster in the region. “The whole idea of a biotech incubator is beginning to catch on in Ventura County and the San Fernando Valley area,” he said. “If we can provide that, we can continue to grow the industry here. And if we don’t, the downside is that many of those people are going to gravitate towards other places,San Diego and elsewhere. From a regional and economic development perspective, we’re certainly aware of that and trying to address these needs.”
