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The year 2017 started with an earthquake for the Swiss biotech sector as the Board of Directors of Actelion recommended to its shareholders to accept the takeover offer from Johnson & Johnson. The price of USD 30 billion was globally the largest amount paid in 2017 for a transaction in the life sciences industry.

An IPO is a veritable option for funding biotech companies. This has been proven by the successful listing of a number of companies on SIX Swiss Exchange in the past two decades.

One of the pioneers in biotechnology, Biogen, is building its next-generation biologic manufacturing facility in Luterbach, Switzerland. It will be the company’s largest production site; fully automated and around four times more productive than existing facilities.

Alongside the global shift from classical chemical synthesis to biotech approaches in the production of active pharmaceutical ingredients, there has been strong expansion in the manufacturing capacities for recombinant proteins and biologics in Switzerland. This has all happened over the last two decades with attractive framework conditions helping to make the chemistry, pharma and biotech sector

The ecosystem of Switzerland’s biotech community is very robust. It has established the critical mass to compete internationally and it delivers innovative products and technologies which contribute strongly to a prosperous economy.

Switzerland has always been an important player in biotechnology and maintains its position amongst the leaders in the face of dynamic global developments. Since 2000, the Swiss biotech patent portfolio has grown significantly; in the first decade the focus was on quantity and thereafter the emphasis has been predominantly on quality. In 2017, half of the Swiss biotech patents qualified as world-c

Past, present and future: the change of focus is particularly relevant to Innosuisse. On 1 January 2018, the organisation previously known as the Commission for Technology and Innovation (CTI) was transformed into Innosuisse – Swiss Innovation Agency. This is a new name and organisational structure but the mission to support science-based innovation in Switzerland is still the same.

Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) has increasingly encouraged researchers to transfer their knowledge and technologies into industry and government for the benefit of the whole society.

Some 40 years ago, in 1978, one of the world’s oldest biotech companies, Biogen, was founded in Geneva, Switzerland. Twenty years later there was a coming of age when representatives from the Swiss biotech industry gave the young industry a voice with the formation of the Swiss Biotech Association (SBA). We look back at the challenges met on the industry’s path to maturity and look forward to