A Golden Age for Life Sciences?

The Scottish Life Sciences Summit returned to Aberdeen today and it was wonderful to be back after the two year break. One of the key themes of the day was whether we had entered into a “Golden Age of Life Sciences Investment” and there were some impressive statistics – £4.5 billion raised by the UK life sciences and biotech sector in 2021 (an increase of £1.7 billion over the year before), with UK companies securing over half of all European venture capital.

It is undoubtedly true that the recent pandemic has brought into sharp focus the importance of innovation in the life science community and the role it plays in public health. From our own perspective, working with many early stage and late stage companies to develop their IP strategies, we have seen a lot of activity in this area in terms of new filings over the last two years. This is of course not surprising as, together with the people and know-how, one of the key assets of an early stage company is its intellectual property.

Life sciences in the North East of Scotland is certainly entering a hugely exciting period with the doors of the new BioHub facility at Foresterhill set to open in late 2022. The BioHub will provide a focal point, infrastructure and support systems for the community and bring together academia, clinicians and bioentreprenerial companies. This “triple helix” approach is a tried and tested method of fostering innovation and promoting growth and I look forward to seeing it develop at the BioHub!