With an injection of DKK 128 million, the biotech collaboration
BIOPRO will continue for a further four years. The collaboration provides both researchers and students at DTU with a unique contact to companies within the biotech area.
Af Lotte Krull og Lotte Grandorf
With investments from several parties, Region Zealand, Innovation Fund Denmark, as well as enterprises and universities, it has been possible to raise DKK 128 million to continue the BIOPRO collaboration up to and including 2018.
Established in 2013, the BIOPRO collaboration aims to boost Denmark's strong position in the field of biotechnological production. DTU is involved in the collaboration through DTU Chemical Engineering.
BIOPRO brings together universities and private enterprises in a unique and close collaboration, and the Danish Minister for Higher Education and Science, Sofie Carsten Nielsen, points out that it is crucial to Denmark's development and welfare society that research and industry are closely related, and that we apply our knowledge in practice in the companies—preferably at a quicker pace than currently.
"We know that when Danish companies come up with good ideas, it is often a result of a collaboration with researchers or knowledge institutions. The grant will hopefully help to stimulate that development even further," says Sofie Carsten Nielsen.
Important contact to biotech companies
At DTU Chemical Engineering, Professor and Head of Centre Krist Gernaey is pleased that the BIOPRO collaboration will continue:
"We know that when Danish companies come up with good ideas, it is often a result of a collaboration with researchers or knowledge institutions."
Sofie Carsten Nielsen, Danish Minister for Higher Education and Science
"It is great to be part of a project which both benefits the competitiveness of Danish companies, strengthens university research, and contributes to developing and creating new jobs in an entire region. In addition, it is important that we as a university remain attractive to students, and in this context the close relations with the companies—facilitated by the BIOPRO project—is a very important factor. Many of the students ultimately end up working for these very companies."
Unique research centre within large-scale production
CEO of Innovation Fund Denmark Peter Høngaard Andersen refers to the massive investments as an important step toward Denmark becoming the natural choice for investments in new biotech production. At the same time, it is important to focus on research.
"With this centre, the universities are given the opportunity to develop and test their research directly in industrial large-scale environments. It provides unique research opportunities while offering the industry the benefits of successful university research. In the long term, this will enable Denmark to expand its strong position in the world market for biotech production."
The ambition is for BIOPRO to produce eight new enterprises and 100-200 new jobs over the next four years. The first enterprise—Biomatics Technology—has just been founded as a result of the collaboration between researchers and industry in BIOPRO.
BIOPRO is a collaboration established in February 2013 between DTU Chemical Engineering, University of Copenhagen, and a number of global market-leading biotech companies that have a close partnership on creating innovative solutions that can improve the competitiveness and sustainability of Danish biotech production.
BIOPRO is sponsored by Region Zealand, the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), and the partners which count Novo Nordisk, Novozymes, DONG Energy, CP Kelco and Chr. Hansen. BIOPRO is headed by the investment and development company CAPNOVA. At the universities, the partners are CAPEC-PROCESS Center at DTU Chemical Engineering, and Department of Food Science at the University of Copenhagen.