BIO Deutschland hosts media briefing on “How good is Germany’s biotechnology?”

On 13 August, BIO Deutschland brought together media and business representatives for a discussion on “How good is Germany’s biotechnology – can we do biotech innovation?”. Enno Spillner and Thomas Taapken, the CFOs of Evotec and Medigene respectively, provided first-hand perspectives on the topic through short talks about their companies’ different business models and biotech activities. They both agreed that Germany had outstanding potential in the field of scientific research. But despite the fact that the country posted good figures in 2017 in terms of raising equity capital, there is, according to the executives, still too little capital available for innovative companies, a situation that poses major challenges for therapy developers lacking a strong service business. They also pointed out that other countries have location advantages over Germany when it comes to tax incentives for research.