While booming biotech hubs thrive across the United States and Europe, clusters of high-tech biotechnology companies are blossoming all around the world. New independent biotechs are sprouting roots next to Big Pharma, CROs, research institutes, anchor tenants and world-class universities.
Among them Geneva, with its unique jet d’eau and glorious snow-capped mountains, is not only Switzerland’s second most populous city. Geneva is also a major biotechnology hub, and its famous ‘Health Valley’ is recovering following Merck Serono’s departure last year. News came in May 2013 that a consortium called Campus Biotech, which includes Swiss billionaires Hansjörg Wyss and Ernesto Bertarelli, has purchased the former Merck Serono building and will transform it into a biotechnology campus. The Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne and the University of Geneva will form an institute at conduct neuro- and bio-engineering at the site. Health Valley, the area from Valais and Geneva to Neuchatel and Bern, counts 750 biotech and medtech firms as residents.