Top Sector Life Sciences & Health

Top Sector LSH Activities

The Top Sector LSH organised many activities in 2017, such as facilitating new public-private partnerships (PPP), supporting new entrepreneurs, and international LSH representation. But also in the field of communication and strategy, 2017 brought the Top Sector some great products with one clear mission: vital functioning citizens, in a healthy economy. Read more in this overview that details the main accomplishments of Top Sector LSH in 2017. 

Public-Private Partnerships: Funding & Projects

The Top Sector Life Sciences & Health (LSH) supports innovative research realised by public-private partnerships (PPP) in the LSH sector. Research organisations, health foundations and companies (start-ups, SMEs and industry) are invited to jointly invest in research and development (R&D) for the benefit of evidence-based innovation and to help build a strong and sustainable LSH sector that contributes to the global societal challenge ‘Health and Care’.

Financial potential Top Sector LSH rapidly increases

Due to the growing LSH sector and the increased familiarity with the PPP Allowance regulation of the Top Sector LSH, the financial potential of the PPP Allowance has increased exponentially: from €4M in 2013 to almost €38M in 2017. This substantial increase in financial resources gives the Top Sector the possibility to invest in more PPP projects and large LSH consortia that aim to tackle diseases through large-scale research and treatment programmes.

Public-private partnerships

Through the PPP Allowance, the Top Sector provides a financial instrument to help consortia made up of research organisations, knowledge institutes, companies, and health foundations to realise their innovative ideas. Consortia can apply for a PPP Allowance twice per year and get co-financing for up to 75% of the R&D costs. So far this Match Call has funded over 150 projects since the Top Sector's founding at the start of 2013. In these projects, over €60M in private cash has been invested by industry and we are pleased to note that SME companies are involved in over 50% of the new projects.


Strategic public-private partnerships

National strategic PPPs in the fields of cardiovascular diseases, dementia, regenerative medicine and cancer research are developing very rapidly and will be expanded further in the coming years. Within the new Knowledge and Innovation Agenda 2018-2021, the LSH coalition has adopted over 30 large-scale consortia. These PPPs could receive further guidance via specialised information sessions, financial resources and matchmaking meetings.


Get more information on the PPP Allowance or examples of R&D projects on the website.

Health~Holland Communication

Throughout the year the Top Sector LSH continuously communicated via it website, bimonthly Updates and social media channels. However our communication efforts involved far more than this. See what has happened under the flag of Health~Holland.

3.000+ visits

Website

With more than 3000 visits per month the official Top Sector LSH website is the central information point of the Dutch LSH sector. Find the latest news, events, calls and relevant publications on the website.

49 projects

Project Page

Reading about new public-private partnerships and their R&D projects can be highly inspiring. Therefore the Top Sector LSH presents its online project page. Currently 49 projects are described on the website. For more examples of public-private partnerships visit the project page on the Health~Holland website.

4x magazines

Bimonthly Health~Holland Updates

Four Health~Holland Updates were published last year. This online magazine brings you the latest insights and developments from the Top Sector Life Sciences & Health. Go to the homepage of Health~Holland website to subcribe for the bimonthly Updates.

Health~Holland Guide

A new Health~Holland Guide has been developed to enlarge the national and international market of Life Sciences & Health SMEs. The guide contains more than 160 company profiles with short descriptions of their business services, which is supported by a thematic matrix of all companies. This year our Nico van Meeteren handed the first edition of the new guide to her Majesty Queen Maxima.

National and International events

In 2017, the Top Sector visited a record number of national and international events. With an audience of scientists, entrepreneurs and government, Health~Holland travelled everywhere. In some cases we turned the event orange to highlight our partnership. We enjoy making new contacts in the LSH sector and telling everybody we meet what we can do for them. Check out the Review, Preview and World Map to get a small impression of events.

Startups & New Ventures: LifeSciences@Work Programme

We help to build your life sciences business

LifeSciences@Work (LS@W) is the national accelerator designed for life sciences researchers with entrepreneurial aspirations, powered by Health~Holland. LS@W supports start-ups during their venture development with coaching, 1-on-1 consults and an intensive network. Within the programme, start-ups can attend the Venture Challenge, Expert Classes and the Value Centre based on their level of development. Please visit the LS@W website and subscribe for the newsletter to get informed.


LS@W startup highlights of 2017:

Strategic Documents: Knowledge & Innovation 

In 2017, the Top Sector LSH published new strategic documents focussing on the global societal challenge ‘Health and Care’. Successful collaboration calls for synergy in strategies. The routes of the Dutch National Research Agenda, strategic policies of the Dutch government, LSH roadmaps, as well as the key enabling technologies and the link with other Top sectors form the foundation of the LSH coalition and our strategic documents.

Knowledge and Innovation Agenda 2018-2021

The Knowledge and Innovation Agenda 2018-2021 titled Grow~Motion describes the health and care ambitions for the next four years (2018-2021). The demand for care is rapidly increasing due to ageing of the population, lifestyle and increase of chronically ill people. In order to properly address this global challenge and exploit economic opportunities, cooperation between citizens, researchers, government and entrepreneurs is essential. 


With the mission ‘vital functioning citizens in a healthy economy’ the LSH coalition will continue to achieve progress in the next years. National strategic public-private partnerships in the field of cardiovascular diseases, dementia, regenerative medicine and cancer research develop at a very rapid pace and will further extend in the upcoming years. In addition, the coalition will continue to search for new public-private partnerships that boost innovation in health and care.


Knowledge and Innovation Contract 2018-2019

The Knowledge and Innovation Contract 2018-2019 titled Glow~Motion complements the health and care ambitions of the LSH coalition by describing the implementation and collective deployment of this agenda. The commitment in the innovation contract focuses on research and innovation within public-private projects and sustainable strategic partnerships directed to specific health issues. Examples of such sustainable public-private partnerships are RegMed XB, Oncode Institute and NeuroTech-NL. In total, the top sector has a commitment of 1.2 billion euros of both public and private contributions in the form of finance or capacity (FTEs).

Learning Communities 2018 - 2021: investment agenda by all Top Sectors

Technological progress and disruption radically change the labour market. People – who cannot quickly adapt to the speed and possess the necessary skills – are at risk of dropping out, which will have a negative impact on our knowledge economy. Learning communities could turn the tide, state the Top Sectors in the investment agenda ‘Learning Communities 2018 - 2021’. This agenda has been presented on 26 June 2017.