Back in 2017, Milan was a leading contender to host the European Medicines Agency, which had to move from London to an EU country following Brexit. After the final round of votes, the Italian city was tied with Amsterdam. The winner was eventually decided by drawing names from a hat; the Dutch capital won. 

Since losing this game of chance, Milan has accelerated the expansion of its pharmaceutical and biotech industries, and its life sciences cluster more broadly, including medical devices, medtech and digital health.  

The Milan area’s network of research hospitals has expanded to 19, and includes leading institutes such as Humanitas and the European Institute of Oncology. Its growing science ecosystem — recognised for specialities as broad as genomics and digital health — is drawing more venture capital (VC) interest. VC funding in the city’s life sciences sector over the past five years is more than double that of the previous five years, Pitchbook data shows. 

The Lombardy region, of which Milan is the capital, has reaffirmed its status as one of Europe’s biggest pharmaceutical producers. Latest figures put its annual production value across all life sciences industries at €74.5bn — over 5% more than the pre-Covid years. The Milan metropolitan area is home to more than 250 pharmaceutical and biotech companies, a figure that Milano & Partners — the city’s promotion agency and destination management organisation — is focused on growing.

Since starting investment attraction activities in 2020, the organisation has prioritised life sciences and fintech business. “These are very important industries in which we feel that the city can offer an important value proposition to foreign entities,” says director general Fiorenza Lipparini. 

The internationalisation of the life sciences cluster extends to the individuals conducting its underlying science. Human Technopole, which opened in Milan in 2019 and is Italy’s biggest life sciences research institute, currently hires 300 scientists coming from 36 countries. “Science is international. It doesn’t have borders, and therefore for us, it’s very important that we are attractive to anybody that comes from anywhere that has a good education and the willingness,” says the institute’s director Marino Zerial.  

A multifaceted approach 

Milan is taking a multi-pronged approach to growing its life sciences hub, and is building a cluster of research, incubators and industrial champions at the Milano Innovation District (MIND) on the city’s outskirts. The hub is less than one third complete, but already hosts the Galeazzi - Sant’Ambrogio research hospital, Human Technopole and British pharma company AstraZeneca. A new life sciences campus is also being developed at MIND by the University of Milan.  

Alessio Beverina, partner at Panakès Partners, a Milan-based VC firm dedicated to life sciences, says: “These things take time, but Cambridge, Boston and Oxford have demonstrated that there is nothing more powerful than having lots of people in the same area talking about the same thing.” 

Milan’s leading pharmaceutical industrial base is also pushing the ecosystem’s evolution, with national champions Bracco and Zambon fostering innovation by working with local start-ups.  

Finally, the city is taking advantage of its large convention centres, Fiera Milano and Allianz MiCo, to leverage the power of running industry events. This October it is hosting CPHI, the world’s biggest annual pharmaceutical exhibition, attended by 62,000 industry participants. Next year, Milan will host BIO-Europe Spring, which attracts executives from more than 50 countries.  

As a tool to grow a life sciences hub, “bringing thousands of industry decision-makers to your home base cannot be overestimated”, says Claire Macht, a director at the event’s organiser, EBD Group. Since last running BIO-Europe Spring in the city in 2011, she’s seen firsthand how Milan’s life sciences industry has grown.

“So much has changed in Milan, in terms of infrastructure and how the city is engaging with the biotech industry,” she says. “In many ways, it’s like coming back to a completely different city.”

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This article is part of the Special Report:
Milan’s life sciences ascent
Read more articles from the report