A NEW incubator to grow life sciences businesses bidding to bring new treatments and drugs to market has hailed a £2 million funding boost.
The BioHub project to accelerate the growth of pioneering companies in Aberdeen has received the backing from Scottish Enterprise for its final fit-out head of its opening later this year.
It will be home to spin-out, start-up and scaling businesses bringing new drugs, treatments, therapies and technology to market and creating high-skilled jobs in the industry sector.
The project is being spearheaded by Opportunity North East (ONE), the lead partner and a co-funder of BioHub, which has secured £20m of capital funding jointly provided by the Scottish Government and UK Government via the Aberdeen City Region Deal. ONE has committed up to £5.6m to BioHub, and NHS Grampian and the University of Aberdeen are strategic partners in the project.
The BioHub is described as a flagship addition to the city’s Foresterhill Health Campus, said to be one of Europe’s largest integrated clinical, research and teaching sites for life sciences and medicine and will catalyse further collaborative innovation across the academic, commercial, and healthcare community.
It represents a £40m investment with the goal of doubling the size of north east Scotland’s life sciences sector.
Kate Forbes, Scottish finance secretary, said the facility “will support ambitious life sciences businesses to grow, including through the creation of highly skilled jobs in Aberdeen, the north east and more widely”, during a visit.
“Through the Aberdeen City Region Deal the Scottish Government is contributing £125 million to the area over ten years,” she said.
“We want to enable everyone to contribute to, and benefit from, a more prosperous, more productive and more internationally competitive economy.”
BioHub will house up to 400 scientific entrepreneurs and 40 tenant businesses at total capacity
Ms Forbes met life sciences leaders from Aberdeen companies NovaBiotics, Elasmogen and TauRx, who have championed the development.
Jennifer Craw, chief executive of ONE, said the Scottish Enterprise funding “further recognises the region’s potential and track record of delivery”.
Ms Craw said: “The continuing investment in BioHub demonstrates the effectiveness of having a long-term economic vision and strategy, backed by public and private funding targeting transformational projects in our key growth sectors.”
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