The university link

Life sciences is a knowledge-intensive industry. For life sciences firms, the linkage between universities and industries is a critical source of new talent and new ideas. For this reason, universities, and their prowess in the life sciences field are a key component of the Science Cities index.

Proximity to top universities and research hospitals has a significant influence on where life science firms choose to locate. Others are spun out of academia itself. The prestige and rigour of these universities are also critical factors as firms will look to hire the best and the brightest to join their teams.

The leading universities in life sciences are concentrated in the US and UK. Of the top 20 highest ranked universities for science, 14 of them are found in our Science Cities. The first ranked is Harvard. Located in Cambridge, Greater Boston, it is well known for supplying top scientists and doctors in the US and worldwide. Second and third in the global rankings are the universities of Oxford and Cambridge in the UK. Big global cities offer the advantages of multiple high ranked institutions: London is home to six of the top-ranked globally for science, with 125,400 students combined, representing a huge prospective pool of talent. Tokyo, another major city, has three top-ranked universities for science with nearly 64,000 students between them.

A university’s research output is illustrative of the innovation happening in the Science Cities, and a proxy of collaboration at the institutional, national and regional level. In 2019, Beijing led the world in the number of life science articles published, counting over 6,000 article citations. New York City, Boston, San Francisco, and Shanghai round out the top five cities by article citations. Combined, the Chinese cities included in our rankings published nearly 10,000 life science article citations over the course of 2019, demonstrating the growing international recognition of the Chinese life sciences environment.

Cost of talent for employers

The cost of employing a highly skilled workforce in the life sciences industry requires a delicate balancing act. Workers will likely choose locations where they will receive the highest return on the investment into their educations and skills – a higher salary, especially relative to living costs. To that end, firms will be looking to minimise their labour costs while still attracting top talent.

While Basel posts the highest salary for scientists of the 20 Savills Science Cities, of the top 10 most expensive workforce locations, seven are located in the United States. Conversely, the least expensive locations to hire workers are in the UK and China. A scientist’s salary in Cambridge UK is 46% lower than the same role in Cambridge (Boston) in the US, and 27% lower than the all-city average. The discount is even greater in the case of Oxford. This demonstrates the comparative value for UK markets for a similarly skilled workforce.

Only in China are staff cheaper among the cities we studied here. The gap is closing, however, as the sector develops and big players expand globally, intensifying the competition for talent.

_{Read the articles within Report: Science Cities below.}