Bioscience a growing piece of West Virginia’s economy

HUNTINGTON, W.Va. — Officials from Marshall, West Virginia University and several businesses related to the bioscience industry gathered Thursday at the Brad D. Smith Foundation Hall on Marshall’s Huntington campus for the eighth annual West Virginia Bioscience Summit.

“Approximately 7,000 jobs currently exist in the bioscience industry in West Virginia,” said Richard Giersch, director of the Health Sciences, Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Commercialization for West Virginia University. “It also has over a dozen startup companies in the last three years or so. It’s a robust part of the economy that is small, but is growing.”