Belgium and the Netherlands have built some of Europe’s strongest life sciences ecosystems, powered by leading research institutions and a growing pool of experienced biotech talent. While early-stage funding remains scarce and investment is often fragmented across regions, investors see national biotech initiatives and broader EU support as catalysts for future growth.
The Benelux region features scientifically strong science clusters in Belgium and the Netherlands, but capital investment remains structurally fragmented. Biotech founders also face a scarcity of early-stage capital.
Regardless, the recycling of talent in the life science ecosystem and aspirations of both countries for a national‑level biotech strategy and aligning with EU initiatives bodes well for future growth.
Strong science foundations
In Belgium, Ghent and Leuven have university hospitals, research institutes and biotechs that nurture vibrant science hubs, said Christina Takke, managing partner at V-Bio Ventures based in Ghent. Brussels and Antwerp have smaller ecosystems.
The VIB (Vlaams Instituut voor Biotechnologie) in Flanders is another key collaborative life science model, bridging academic excellence to economic output, Takke said. VIB propelled understanding of university spin-outs and set out a blueprint for doing so that would be efficient. It considered countries where infrastructure is in place for early-stage co-creation, such as Germany, France and Denmark as models, Takke said.
In addition, Belgium’s strength comes from successful, home-grown players, such as Argenx and Ablynx, and subsequent workforce mobility.
VIB’s model has been copied in the Netherlands, said Mariette van der Velden-Roesink, founding partner at Curie Capital in Amstelveen. She cited as one example Oncode Institute, comprised of 13 partnered institutes to accelerate the journey from scientific discovery to commercialization.
Also in the Netherlands, Utrecht, Leiden, Eindhoven, Oss and Amsterdam create a dynamic environment with respective science parks, van der Velden-Roesink said. An April 2026 report by life science database company Biotechgate cites 1,988 sector companies in the country.
Luxembourg faces a greater uphill battle as it doesn’t yet have a science base or biotech companies to generate talent cycles.
In terms of transitioning university research to real-world applications in Belgium and the Netherlands, the bottleneck isn’t IP negotiation, Takke said. Rather, it’s the simultaneous pressure on universities to form a company, recruit management and secure funding simultaneously.
What would be more beneficial to science translation would be an expanded environment with dedicated translational funding and industry experience, Takke said. As an example, V-Bio Ventures has relationships with tech transfer offices that allow for proposal review and brainstorming of potentially sound company ideas.
Another gap is the lack of seasoned teams, especially for medtech where early revenue matters, in the transition to company success, van der Velden-Roesink said. Purely academic teams struggle without commercial expertise.
Tight investment flows
Despite the vibrant academic science atmosphere, government funds often require headquarters to be in their region, limiting cross-national investment potential, Takke said. Unfortunately, this is a constraint that won’t disappear because it’s taxpayer money.
Van der Velden-Roesink confirmed this observation, noting that even Curie Capital is currently restricted to invest in funds in the Netherlands because it has support from the Dutch government.
Both noted there are also sometimes interregional restrictions on capital investment.
The scarcity of private, early-stage capital in the region pushes companies to go to other European or U.S. investors, Takke said. The latter has more diverse investor pools, such as pension funds. Thus, European biotechs have to consider investment syndication from day one.
In 2024, private R&D investments in the Netherlands amounted to €900 million, a fraction of what countries like Belgium and Switzerland invested, noted a KPMG 2025 life science report.
As BioSpace has previously discussed in past Denatured podcasts on the European financing landscape, the dearth of pension fund involvement in European capital creates a massive scale-up funding gap. In turn, Europe’s innovative companies are forced to rely on foreign capital while depriving local savers of higher investment returns.
Future remains optimistic
“A national strategy for life sciences can help attract investors, stimulating growth and innovation in a country,” the KPMG report notes.
In Belgium, additional government budgets are being used to raise the country’s international profile as a ‘health & pharma valley,” stated Stéphanie Rutten, CEO of AmCham BelgiumRutten, in the report.
The Netherlands is shifting toward such a country-wide biotech strategy, van der Velden-Roesink said. She noted initiatives such as InvestNL a private company with the Ministry of Finance designed to accelerate innovation through capital, and Biotech Booster, a Dutch government initiative to speed the commercialization of biotechnology findings.
These moves align with broader E.U. initiatives like the European Biotech Act, she added. The proposed legislation’s goals include “a comprehensive framework to increase competitiveness by creating the necessary conditions for the health biotechnology sector to thrive.”
