Leipzig: Europe's New Biotech Hub

There’s no question about it - biotech is one of the fastest moving and innovative verticals currently. Not one to be left behind, New York City is pushing to get up its ranking in biotech, probably the only sector where Boston still has an edge. In several locations along the East River, the city has leveraged private funds and is investing over $100 million in biotech startups with new initiatives like Pilot Health Tech NYC and the Early Stage Life Sciences Funding Initiative.One of the keys to success will be international collaboration. New York City’s proximity to the world will become the number one factor for startups in the sector to start and expand here. Two cities seem especially interesting for the city: Vienna in Austria and Leipzig in Germany. We recently talked about Vienna here, and today had a chance to catch up with Helen Stöhr, the international market developer at the newly founded “Invest Region Leipzig,” which aims to bring mid-sized companies to Leipzig while also promoting international growth.Germany is already a leader in biotech, with a record three billion euros in turnover generated. Though a city of only half a million inhabitants, more than 35,000 people work in Leipzig in the field of life science (this has grown 35% since 2005).Leipzig is already the home of global player Qiagen and the new Bio City Leipzig, a center for biotechnology and bioscience comprising of more than 20 companies. As an example of one of the projects based in Bio City - the Fraunhofer Institute for Cell Therapy and Immunology and Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis are collaborating on joint cancer therapy.Lead by Berlin, which is only 120 miles away, the region is becoming the coolest urban combination of work and life. It is currently a “Gamma World City,” recognized for linking the region’s economy to that of the world.We will certainly keep Leipzig on our radar!