“You have everything you need here in Groningen. The challenge is to organise it, create a common goal and work together. If you have the courage to collaborate and stay the course, you can create value far beyond this region.” This message from former ASML CEO Peter Wennink was a key theme of the fifth edition of the LIFE Science Conference, held on Tuesday 22 September at Forum Groningen. With his keynote, Wennink also echoed the findings of his national advisory report The Route to Future Prosperity, in which he calls for strengthening the Netherlands’ capacity to generate economic value.
More than 200 professionals from the Life Sciences & Health sector came together to discuss what is needed to further translate Northern Netherlands’ strong position in knowledge and innovation into business activity, new value chains and economic growth. In addition to Wennink’s keynote and a panel discussion featuring Nobel Prize winner Ben Feringa, Stephanie Klein Nagelvoort-Schuit (UMCG) and Jakob Klompien (Nij Begun’s Economic Agenda), the LIFE Cooperative presented its strategic industry agenda with five themes. The LIFE Science Innovation Award, worth €10,000, was also presented to winner Mimecure.
Groningen Head of Economic Affairs Saskia van Ham and Peter Ketelaar, chair of the LIFE Cooperative, opened the conference. In her welcome address, Van Ham emphasised that innovation only creates societal and economic value when knowledge and technology find their way into practice. This requires close collaboration between science, entrepreneurship, government and healthcare, as well as the space to scale successful innovations.
That is why the LIFE Cooperative now works with a five-theme industry agenda: Enabling Health Tech, Polymers for Health, Diagnostics & Drug Development, Sustainable Pharma Production and Nuclear Medicine. The agenda provides direction for the development of the sector.
Under the Enabling Health Tech theme, for example, more than 25 companies are developing technologies that contribute to patient wellbeing and to making healthcare sustainably accessible and affordable. To enable these companies to grow further, additional infrastructure for industrialisation is needed, including shared testing and production facilities. According to the LIFE Cooperative, this could help Northern Netherlands develop into a European hotspot for Enabling Health Tech.
One of the highlights of the conference was the presentation of the LIFE Science Innovation Award. From five nominees, MimeCure, Flux Robotics, GlycanScan International, Limosa Immunodiagnostics and SPCTR, the five-member jury selected MimeCure as the winner.
Erik Frijlink, director and co-founder of MimeCure: “Winning the LIFE Science Innovation Award is a great recognition for innovative drug development in Northern Netherlands.”
The five nominees demonstrated the breadth and innovative strength of the Life Sciences & Health sector in Northern Netherlands during their pitches. Their innovations ranged from new applications in healthcare and robotics to technologies for early diagnostics and immunotherapy.
The fifth edition of the LIFE Science Conference once again underlined its role as an important driver and connector within the Life Sciences & Health ecosystem.
“From vision to impact sounds simple, but the reality is more complex. Today, we saw that it is possible when science, entrepreneurship, government and healthcare succeed in finding each other. It is through genuine collaboration at regional, national and international level that we can make a difference. That is exactly what makes our ecosystem strong, and we are proud of that,” says Ronald Hesse, director of the LIFE Cooperative.
The LIFE Science Conference 2026 is co-financed by:
