1 February 2013Big Pharma

Hub and spoke? Life sciences in Northern France

The French biotech and life sciences industry is, if not necessarily booming, more than pulling its weight in a tough economic climate. In the teeth of the worst crisis in living memory, France finds itself playing host to some of Europe’s most innovative companies in the sector, driven by clusters of research and development across the country.

One of the largest of these clusters is in the Lille Nord-Pas de Calais region. Its genesis is a mix of geographical accident and strategic design, but today it plays host to more than 800 companies involved in the biotech sector, employing more than 22,000 people.

Geographically, it makes sense. Lille is extremely well served by transport links, making it easy to do business whether you’re from London or Berlin. Indeed, Nord France Invest, which aims to attract business to the region, trumpets the fact that the city lies almost in the middle of six European capitals. And it’s no coincidence that Lille has a Eurostar station, the first city stop in continental Europe for those arriving from London. The local government and industry lobbied hard to ensure that happened.

More than that though, there is a strong academic rationale for the industry. The University of Lille Nord de France is spread across six different campuses, and is one of the largest in the country. In a similar vein, the local hospital is actually seven hospitals, employing 2,750 doctors. So the potential for innovative companies to gain support from academic institutions and the profession that may end up practising their inventions is huge.

Of course, the Lille Nord-Pas de Calais region is not alone in this. Most biotech and life sciences clusters grow up around academic institutions and medical facilities, almost by definition. There are other assets too, though.

“Eurasanté provides participating companies with training on the legal aspects of R&D including IP protection, as well as guidance on the regulatory challenges of conducting clinical trials.”

For start-up companies, seed capital worth up to €1 million is available in the right circumstances, while companies working in the Eurasanté Bioincubator facility in the Bio Business Park can benefit from substantial tax breaks (sometimes an effective corporate tax rate of zero), given the right criteria. Eurasanté is an agency designed to stimulate economic development of the health sector in Lille and its surrounds.

But who are the companies? Well, there are some big pharmaceutical players with a presence in the region, as you’d expect. The likes of AstraZeneca, Bayer Schering Pharma and GSK Biologicals all have operations there. There are food and nutrition companies (Roquette is perhaps the most significant in this area), and then there are myriad smaller players, start-ups and SMEs, which have developed in the region, and many of which have benefited from the tax incentives available.

As for intellectual property, Eurasanté provides participating companies with training on the legal aspects of R&D including IP protection, as well as guidance on the regulatory challenges of conducting clinical trials and the ethical burdens companies in the sector must observe.

That said, when LSIPR visited, a spokesperson for one company managed to show a slide to journalists containing information about developing technology that was not yet protected by IP. He hastily withdrew the slide on realising his mistake, but perhaps such errors indicate that IP education, especially for the newer companies, could be improved.

Other networking and education opportunities come in the form of the BioFit conference, which was held in Lille in 2010 and again, in December 2012. Panels on collaborative R&D, IP in the tech transfer process, and out-licensing deals with big pharma all aimed to provide guidance on the various hurdles companies need to overcome in order to secure their innovations.

With more than 350 attendees spread between academia, pharmaceutical companies, tech transfer offices and cluster representatives, in theory it provides an excellent opportunity for innovative companies to fill the gaps in their knowledge. The BioFit conference will take place in Dresden later this year, before returning to Lille in 2014.

Lille Nord-Pas de Calais may not be the largest life sciences cluster around (or even the largest in France), but it does boast some unique assets that should ensure it continues to grow. And France, Europe and the wider life sciences and biotech industry should all hope that it does. After all, cluster development is a strategic objective of Europe’s Competitiveness Council, and in a sustained economic downturn, the ability to innovate is arguably more crucial than ever.