Medicon Valley - a life sciences hub across borders

To outsiders, a life sciences hub that crosses a national border and 8 kilometres of cold water might seem strange. However, the island of Zealand in eastern Denmark – home to Copenhagen - and the Skåne region in the southern part of Sweden together constitute Medicon Valley.

It is home to 350 biotech, pharma and medtech companies, including major international players such as Lundbeck and Novo Nordisk – all benefiting from the valley’s unique combination of favourable conditions, where its spirit of collaboration stands out in particular.

The perfect combination of science and business

Medicon Valley is home to no less than nine universities, mainly placed in the three largest cities, which are Lund, Copenhagen and Malmø. These foster 6000 PhD students annually and 90% of all Scandinavian life sciences students graduate in the area. Furthermore, the universities employ nearly 7,000 life-sciences researchers. Of these, the University of Copenhagen comes out on top in international rankings, when looking at publication volume and citations.

As elsewhere, interactions between academia and industry have grown, thanks in part to policy initiatives such as the strengthening of technology-transfer offices and wider cultural exchanges.

Collaboration pays off

The growing emphasis on collaboration and networking in Medicon Valley is underlined by the rise of the region’s science parks, where researchers, entrepreneurs and established businesses learn from each other.

Before the bridge and the creation of Medicon Valley, the only science parks in the area were Ideon in Lund, Medeon in Malmö and Symbion in Copenhagen. Since 2004, three more have opened. Today, one in ten companies working with life sciences in the region is based in a science park.

“There’s a lot of buzz in the sector right now,” says Morten Mølgaard Jensen, Chief Executive at Copenhagen Bio Science Park, which serves to support early-stage life-sciences organisations.

“The number of new projects and companies spinning out of institutions is on the rise. We offer an environment where everyone knows each other and start-ups can get established while enjoying cheap offices and access to shared lab space.”

Ideal conditions for foreign life science companies

An ecosystem of companies, universities and science parks combined with a great business climate have created an attractive environment for foreign life sciences companies to thrive.