Currently, 50% of the drugs in experimentation are biotechnological. Within a few years, eight out of 10 drugs will be biotech, with an exponential economic growth of the market, projected to increase from 485 billion euros in 2020 to 1.447 trillion euros in 2028. These are some of the figures that emerged during the event ‘Meet the Future: The New Frontiers of Biotech,’ organized by Assobiotec, the National Association of Federchimica for the development of biotechnologies, at the Auditorium della Conciliazione in Rome.
“In the future, especially in the healthcare sector, dealing with biotechnologies will be absolutely normal. Vaccines are already biotechnological, and diagnostics are becoming increasingly so,” explained Fabrizio Greco, Assobiotec-Federchimica President, to the audience. “As a country, we must strive to become an active force in the field of biotechnologies,” Greco continued. “Today, to grow and compete on the international stage, it is crucial to have a shared vision of an ecosystem that fosters the development of innovative ideas and enables their transformation into solutions for citizens. The path, that the government is working on, is a very important response in this direction. We hope,” concluded the Assobiotec-Federchimica President, “that the National Biotechnology Strategy can finally represent the control room where can converge many actions and various actors involved in creating Italian excellence in biotechnological innovation.”
The response came from Ministero delle imprese e del made in Italy (MIMIT), Adolfo Urso, in a video message sent to the audience of Meet the Future.
“Today’s event, with many young people in the audience, provides an important overview of a strategic sector for the country, with a turnover of over 13 billion euros and significant investments in Research & Development,” explained Urso. “Biotechnologies are an essential part of the new industrial policy strategy that the government unveiled at the beginning of the legislature.
“Meet the Future: le nuove frontiere del biotech” is an initiative born to discuss and reflect, together with young people, on biotechnologies and the future, organized by Federchimica Assobiotec with the support of the media company StartupItalia and thanks to AbbVie, AGC Biologics, Alexion, Aptuit Verona (an Evotec company), AstraZeneca sponsorships; Biosphere, Bristol Myers Squibb, Chiesi, DiaSorin, Genenta Science, Gilead, Novartis, Pfizer, Roche, Rottapharm Biotech, Sanofi, Takeda, UCB, Vertex. The event is Biotech Week 2023 final appointment and it is part of the project “Biotech, il futuro migliore. Per la nostra salute, per il nostro ambiente, per l’Italia” which has been spreading awareness and knowledge about the enormous possibilities offered by an industrial sector that recent EY data predict will triple globally between 2020 and 2028.”