Gilles Duluc, director of innovation at the Bordeaux University Hospital; Laurence Lachamp, director of Alli-NA; Marc Chevalier, director of innovation at the IHU Liryc; and Franck Mouthon, president of France Biotech. Credits: France Biotech
The “healtech” sector now represents 15% of salaried employment in Nouvelle-Aquitaine. If the region, and in particular the Gironde, has several innovative companies in the field of health, the players in the sector want to strengthen their position, and aim to make the region “the French Boston”.
Last week, the association of professionals France Biotech, which brings together the healthtech sector in France, presented its annual panorama from Bordeaux. A panorama allowing to measure the evolutions of the sector, from the development of products to the capacity to recruit, through the training needs. More than 2,000 companies are currently active in France, for a sector beginning to have “a certain maturity”says Chloé Evans, head of sector studies and international relations at France Biotech. “We are seeing an increase in budgets dedicated to R&D, of 20% on average compared to 2020, explains the young woman. And business turnover has doubled, on average, over the past five years. »
If the health sector is developing on a national scale, it is also experiencing real dynamism in New Aquitaine, and more specifically in Gironde. “Today, the region has all the representatives of the healthtech value chain. Our great strength is to have both industrial players, and to be efficient in the course of care and research », rejoices Laurence Lachamp, director of the Health Innovation Alliance in New Aquitaine (Allis-Na). In figures, this performance translates into 250 companies covering all sectors of activity (biotechnology, sterile health products and digital health), half of which are startups. Throughout the region, health represents 15% of salaried employment, including 60,000 jobs in the Bordeaux metropolitan area alone.
Soon a health innovation campus?
Three “nuggets” radiate today, leading figures in the Gironde healthtech sector. Treefrog Therapeutics, which is working on a new generation of cell therapies; Aelis Farma, which is developing a new category of drugs, and Fineheart, creator of an innovative heart pump. “It is a sterile medical device, and this is one of the areas in which New Aquitaine excels, resumes Laurence Lachamp. There is also I.Ceram in Limoges, Implanet in Bordeaux or Meccellis Biotech in La Rochelle. » Companies developing products “with very similar approaches” : whose development is of high added value, and which must then be brought to the patient.
This is where companies benefit from a solid ecosystem. “We have major international players who have decided to place their production and service sites in the region, and this is no accident. Before reaching the industrial production stage, it is necessary to be able to manufacture the small clinical batch that the teams from the Bordeaux University Hospital will be able to test… And that is very important, “insists the director of Allis-NA. . To strengthen this ecosystem, a third place for experimentation could also see the light of day on the territory, as well as a campus dedicated to innovation. Without going into details, the director of clinical research and innovation at the Bordeaux University Hospital, Gilles Duluc, reveals the outlines of the project: “We have the collective will, around the IHU Liryc, to densify and increase our capacity to create a health innovation campus in the relatively near future. By enhancing what already exists, and by considering other developments of means of growth for businesses in the area. »
Better support businesses
From medical establishments to universities, via start-up support structures, for the Neo-Aquitaine sector, the objective is clear: to become the French “Boston”. Indeed, the American city, located in the state of Massachusetts, is today the world capital of biotech. “We think we are the only region capable of being this center of attraction for healthtech in France, says Laurence Lachamp. Boston is a worldwide success because they knew how to work as a team, and that is our ambition. »
But to achieve this objective, we must be able to support innovation, from the laboratory to the patient’s bedside. “In France, we support the birth of startups very well, there are a lot of financing tools that are possible at the very beginning, it is then that it gets complicated, explains to Placéco Professor Pierre Jaïs, Director General of the IHU Liryc. The most significant fundraising, beyond seeding, is complicated in France and that, in my opinion, is the big difference with the United States. There aren’t really any French players, not really any European players either, and that works against us. It contributes to what I call an unfavorable environment, to move from a startup to something bigger. »
So how do we support innovation in healthcare? Placéco went to meet several players in the field, and this week offers you a series of articles on the subject.