Biotechnology industry pessimistic about the year ahead shows trend survey
After two years of record investment, the German biotechnology industry was only able to raise around €920 million in equity capital in 2022, less than a third of the amount raised in 2020, the first year of the pandemic. This sum was almost equally divided between private and listed companies. In the annual trend survey by biotech association BIO Deutschland, board members and company directors were significantly less satisfied with their current business situation than in previous years. The outlook for the coming year is also bleak, even more so than during the 2008 financial crisis. More than half of respondents (54 percent) said the energy crisis was negatively impacting their business situation. One-fifth and one-half are strongly and moderately feeling the effects of inflation, respectively.
Far fewer respondents than in 2021 said they planned to hire more staff. Plus, the willingness to ramp up spending on R&D decreased markedly. Although in the last two years company leaders had assessed the current and future political climate to be extremely positive for the industry, this index has now fallen back to pre-pandemic levels.
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