The reality of using cells for therapy and regenerative medicine has only come about in the last 10 years. The origins of pharmaceuticals were largely embedded in small molecules, but the rise of biotechnology brought an exciting change to medicine in opening up the use of larger molecules. These breakthroughs fitted the standard business model of the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry, but there is one big difference in the advances in stem cell research: most of its funding has not come from the traditional business model sources of venture capital or the internal budgets of company R&D departments. As now, governments and not-for-profit institutions will continue to fund stem cell research, with other funding sources likely to be the payers of private and national health insurance, an area in which some pharmaceutical companies have already made moves.