German Biotechnology Report 2019: Biotechnology companies in Germany continue to grow. However, the familiar problems, especially the lack of a functioning venture capital ecosystem, persist.
The industry's revenue rose by nine percent year-on-year to €4.36 billion in 2018. At the same time, the number of employees climbed by five percent to 27,445. However, indicators of dynamism and innovation—research and development spending and new start-ups—fell short of expectations: After years of decline, R&D spending rose by four percent to €1.23 billion. The number of new start-ups, however, fell again. After 27 start-ups in 2017, only 15 start-ups were launched last year.
Too little capital for cost-intensive therapeutic development
What is particularly alarming about the new company start-up figures is that the proportion of therapeutics developers has declined significantly—from 60 percent in the previous year to just 20 percent in 2018. This is an indication that biotech companies in Germany are having difficulty obtaining capital, as therapeutics development in particular is very cost-intensive.
These are the results of the German Biotechnology Report 2019 by the auditing and consulting firm EY in cooperation with the industry association BIO Deutschland.
Financing at record levels — but only a few transactions
Only in apparent contrast to the subdued development of new start-ups is the explosive growth of venture capital for biotech companies: Investments increased by 92 percent to €385 million compared to the previous year. Capital increases even climbed by 153 percent to €859 million, so that the bottom line is a doubling of financing for Biotechs in Germany stands at 1.24 billion euros — a record.
A closer look, however, reveals that only a few transactions were responsible for the increase. For example, BioNTech's record financing of €228.8 million—the largest financing of a biotech company in Germany ever. Without this financing, venture capital investments would have declined by 22 percent to €157 million last year.
German Biotechnology Report: “Broad-based financing is on shaky ground”
The study author and head of EY’s German Life Science Center, Dr. Siegfried Bialojan, comments on the figures:
"Revenues and employee numbers in the biotechnology industry in Germany continue to grow. Financing also appears to be in order—after all, German biotechs have been able to attract more capital than ever before. However, this should not obscure the fact that financing across the board is on shaky ground. A few companies attracted a large portion of the financing last year. This makes it particularly difficult for expensive therapeutics development in this country. The fundamental problem therefore remains: there is a lack of a capital ecosystem that systematically puts innovation on track in Germany."
Also Dr. Peter Heinrich, Chairman of the Board of BIO Deutschland e. V., views the development with mixed feelings:
"2018 was a record year for biotechnology funding in Germany—that's very encouraging. However, far too few outstanding research and development results are still being applied in this country. We are currently observing the consequences of this: relatively low research and development spending and fewer start-ups. We need a culture of courage and risk-taking in Germany, as well as better-functioning technology transfer, to reverse this trend."
