I think there's room to tweak the science leader abilities (which are essentially faction abilities since there's no choice of leaders) to get more setting flavor out of them, and to adjust faction balance where necessary, but at present I don't think they're terrible. They're deliberately asymmetrical; not all factions need to be as good at science as all the others.
We wanted to have a fuller leader/character system (and created the initial set of Ashdar character portraits with this in mind), but we won't have time to implement it for the initial release. I really like leader systems, and so this is one of my highest priorities for post-release content, along with new playable factions.
zolobolo wrote:It would be interesting to have leader characters from the comic the art and universe is based upon (The art is sort of available and there is already backstory for them that can be translated into the game mechanic)
If you're referring to Outsider, the SIS universe is not based on that. It would be cute to have an Outsider mod or DLC for SIS, but that's something to consider for the future...