Updated March 07, 2014.

Are you a drug researcher interested in living on the West Coast? California not your style? Fear not, and look north. Seattle, Washington hums with research activity. Whether you prefer the corporate culture or academic, you'll have choices. And if you're particularly motivated to cure cancer, you'll find like-minded colleagues in Seattle.

Fast-Growing Research Job Market in the Seattle Area

Seattle has one of the fastest-growing research job markets in the nation.

The interesting thing about every life sciences cluster is that they all develop their own personality. For Seattle, the area has developed a reputation for intense cancer research. With all that is going on here, Seattle is starting to develop a reputation for attracting minds and money devoted to understanding and curing cancer.

Seattle boasts nearly 1,000 organizations in the life sciences industry, with an estimated 22,000 employed directly in the field. In the medical field, there's almost 200,000 employed in the Seattle area, in addition to the 22,000 in life sciences. That means lots of collaboration opportunities for individuals and organizations.

If you work in the manufacturing side of the life sciences industry, Seattle offers very little opportunity. The area has carved out a strong emphasis in its local personality in the research and development phases of drug discovery.

Major Employers

• University of Washington Medicine 
• Seattle Cancer Care Alliance
• Amgen
• Seattle Genetics
• Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research

• Bristol-Myers Squibb

How Seattle Compares

?Seattle typically ranks as the 10th largest life sciences cluster in the United States because of its weighted score ranking across:

• Life sciences employment, including percentage of the area's population that the U.S. Bureau of Labor statistics has found to be working in these industries
• The percentage of the area's organizations (businesses, hospitals, universities, etc.) that fit into these industries
• The amount of venture capital funding invested in the biotechnology and medical device sector
• The amount of funding (grants) from the National Institutes of Health.

Across these four categories, the various clusters are measured and weighed so that we can create a baseline to compare the regions to each other. There can always be debate as to whether these weighted measures are the appropriate criteria, or whether there should be different or additional criteria. For our purposes here, which is to paint a broad-brush view of the job opportunities, the "rankings" are less important. Whether you're looking for a job in San Diego, Philadelphia, or Seattle, if the job and the region is the right "fit" for you, your lifestyle, your family, your career goals, etc., then those personal criteria will of course outweigh any third-party opinion of which cluster is ranked "first" and which is ranked "tenth".

That said, here is how Seattle compares to the rest of the clusters in the United States, on the 4 specific criteria in the above bullet points: 

• ranks 12th in attracting venture capital funding; 
• ranks 7th in funding awards from the National Institutes of Health;
• has the 13th highest percentage of its population in the life sciences industry;
• has the 15th highest percentage of its organizations in the life sciences industry.

The Seattle Cluster's Sub-Markets

South Lake Union

• Nearly 3 million square feet of life science space
• Urban area
• Known for having lots of amenities to attract and retain top talent

Bothell

• Roughly 800,000 square feet of life sciences space
• Canyon Park and North Creek areas 
• More suburban feel than South Lake Union

 

In addition to the direct company links in this article, you can also find broader job-search functions in the following resources provided by About.com's Job Search Expert, Alison Doyle:

Best Job Websites

Best Job Search Engine Sites

 

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