Our mission is to make Biopôle one of the leading life sciences ecosystems globally, driving innovation in healthcare by bringing together a broad range of skills, disciplines and organisations, and by fostering openness and exchange within our diverse community.
Biopôle SA bases all its plans and activities on the needs of its members: we do our utmost to provide our members with everything they need to thrive and we are continuously developing new solutions to support their growth.
Looking ahead, we are excited to be opening three new buildings in 2025, providing an additional 23,000 m2 of office and laboratory space. In the same year, we also plan to inaugurate the SE-C building: it will host laboratory and good manufacturing practice (GMP) facilities for the Lausanne University Hospital (CHUV), University of Lausanne (UNIL) and Ludwig Cancer Research. By this point, the Biopôle site is projected to encompass a total area of 100,000 m2, making it the largest – and hopefully most vibrant and dynamic – life sciences campus in Europe.
In 2020, the Serine building was completed, bringing Biopôle’s total constructed surface area to around 54,000 m2. In the same year, ADC Therapeutics joined NASDAQ, Biopôle SA announced our first corporate partners – CSL Behring and Clinique La Prairie – and Nouria Hernandez was appointed President of Biopôle SA’s Board of Directors.
The next year, in 2021, we introduced the Biopôle Start-up Fund with a total of CHF 500,000 in funding per year. Meanwhile, Superlab Suisse SA launched its first branch on campus and Ferring Pharmaceuticals opened the Ferring Biologics Innovation Centre. In the same year, Bristol Myers Squibb and the Swiss Medical Network also became Biopôle SA corporate partners, and we launched the Vanguard Accelerator programme for digital health-oriented projects.
In 2023, both StartLab and the Digital Health Hub (DH2) moved to bigger spaces, Roche Diagnostics and CSL Behring set up offices on campus, and several large corporations, including Novartis, Roche and BMS, became Biopôle corporate partners. In September, the Leucine building was also completed.
Today, the campus includes more than 150 life sciences companies and 25 service-oriented companies, with a total of 2,700 residents.
In October 2015, Biopôle SA’s Board of Directors appointed the current CEO, Nasri Nahas, to implement a new strategy for the campus. By then, Biopôle had become home to 20 life sciences companies and 25 research organisations, making up a workforce of 1,500 people.
In July 2016, a new board of directors was appointed: a key step towards making our new
strategy a reality and becoming a leading life sciences community. In the same year, the CHUV’s Cellular Manufacturing Facility – dedicated to immunotherapy treatments – opened on campus.
The following year saw the completion of the Alanine building. Meanwhile, ADC Therapeutics raised US$200 million and became one of the few unicorn private biotech start-ups in Europe, with a company valuation of US$1.3 billion.
In 2018, Biopôle SA opened StartLab, a fully equipped, shared and serviced lab space. The following year also saw the launch of DH2 to welcome companies working on digital health solutions.
The first two buildings on the campus – Metio and Lysine – were finished in 2009. It was at this point that the first biotech and diagnostics companies set up their operations here at Biopôle. These early members included Xigen, Anergis, Legacy Healthcare, Mymetics, Unilabs and AdipoGen. By 2012, three more buildings had opened and Unisanté had joined the campus.
Phenyl – a new building – was inaugurated two years later, in 2014. In the same year, we welcomed new multinationals Nestlé Health Science, ADC Therapeutics and ARIAD Pharmaceuticals (now Incyte).
The story of the Biopôle campus began in September 2000, when a project called Le Biopôle de
Vennes was presented to the canton of Vaud’s State Council. The intention was to create a campus dedicated to the health sector, with a particular focus on innovation. Three years later, in autumn 2003, Vaud’s Grand Council approved the Vennes–Biopôle development. And in December 2004, Biopôle SA was founded by Vaud’s public authorities.
By 2008, the canton of Vaud had decided to centralise biomedical research at UNIL, the CHUV and Ludwig Cancer Research on the Biopôle campus.
