BioEntrepreneurship Month: three regions, one question
How does research become a company? The answer depends on where in Europe you are standing. Funding, talent, networks: the playbook changes from one region to the next.
So we are putting that question to the people who know the terrain. BioEntrepreneurship Month is a series of three virtual round tables across November and December, built with Nucleate and our institutional members, one for each part of Europe: Southern, Western-Central and Eastern-Central.
First up is Bioentrepreneurship in Western Europe, co-organised with our institutional member BioScience Network Lausanne (BSNL) and Nucleate Switzerland.
Tuesday 24 November, 18:00–20:00 CET, online. On the panel:
- Markus Pietzka, start:IP programme manager, INiTS Universitäres Gründerservice Wien
- Oleksandr Yagensky, co-founder and co-CEO, OVO-Labs
- Pierre-Jean Wipff, director of innovation and partnerships, Biopôle
- Maria Lamottke, head of business development, BiCoLL
- Stéphanie Lefebvre, director, Paris Biotech Santé
- Cedric Odje, senior associate, Debiopharm Innovation Fund
The Southern and Eastern-Central dates follow soon. Miss one and you miss a whole region.
A special thank you to BSNL, and in particular to Nicolas Grinberg, for bringing us into this project. Biotech moves through collaboration, between labs, networks and borders. Building those bridges is exactly what YEBN is here for.
The Opportunities Board opens on 23 November
Jobs, internships, training. One place, built for early-career biotechnologists.
On Monday 23 November we launch the YEBN Opportunities Board: a members-only space on yebn.eu where the organisations in our network share job offers, internships and educational opportunities from across the European biotech ecosystem.
What members get:
- Full listings, including how to apply, for every offer on the board
- Offers shared directly by the companies, institutes and programmes in our network
- No password to remember: you sign in with a one-time link sent to your email
- New offers announced in the members’ WhatsApp community as they arrive
Anyone will be able to browse a preview of what is on the board. Applying is for members. If you are not one yet, now is the moment: membership is €25 a year, and free for active volunteers and for members of one of our institutional member organisations.
We will announce the first participating organisations over the coming weeks. Recruiting yourself? If your organisation would like to share an offer with the network, write to us.
Become a member before 23 November
Your community on WhatsApp, from 6 November
On 6 November we launch a WhatsApp community for every YEBN member. It will be where things land first:
- new offers from the Opportunities Board
- upcoming events, ours and our partners’
- exclusive opportunities, such as access to external events
All members will receive an email with the invitation when the community opens. Not a member yet? Join before 6 November and you will be in from day one. Membership is €25 a year, and free for active volunteers and for members of one of our institutional member organisations.
In the room: YEBN at BIOSPAIN, and where we go next
From 29 September to 1 October, YEBN was at BIOSPAIN 2026 in Bilbao as an official supporter, with our Vice President, Álex Moreno Armengol, representing the network. More than 4,000 one-to-one meetings in three days, under a fitting motto: Bioinnovation that clicks.
Our highlight was Talent Day, the event’s flagship recruitment session, supported by our institutional member FEBiotec. Companies with real vacancies, candidates with real profiles, and twenty minutes face to face to see if they fit. Not a CV lost in a portal: a conversation. Thank you to FEBiotec and AseBio for making it possible for us to be in Bilbao.
That is what a network is for. One of us gets through the door, and the door stays open for the next. Our active members represent YEBN in rooms like these: they meet the people shaping the sector and bring those connections home for everyone. Before the year ends, we will be in three more.
Where we go next
- Plexus Conference, Zagreb, 4–5 December. Med&X brings young physicians and scientists together with leaders in biomedicine around AI in medicine and the career paths behind them, setbacks included. The conference is free with registration.
- Forum Biotechno Sud, Marseille, 9 December. Organised at the World Trade Center by our institutional member Réseau Biotechno with Bio’M: plenaries on innovation and entrepreneurship, round tables, career workshops from CV reviews to mock interviews, and a networking village for PhD students, postdocs and life science students.
- Biotech Day, Strasbourg, 10 December. A full day at ESBS, co-organised by our institutional member Nouvelle Génération des Biotechnologistes (NGB): talks, discussions and a poster session for doctoral students. Free, with registration required.
Want to be the one in the room next time? Become an active volunteer: membership is free, and you help shape our events, partnerships and content. If you belong to one of our institutional member organisations, your membership is free too.
SPBN × YEBN: our first joint event
On 14 October, around 50 people joined From hype to impact: AI in pharma and biotech through Saudi and European lenses, the first event of our new partnership with the Saudi Pharma and Biotech Network (SPBN).
Moderated by Syed Zaffer (AiQL), with Dr Monther Alhamdoosh bringing the Saudi perspective and Ray G. Butler (Butler Scientifics) the European one, the conversation kept returning to one idea: two ecosystems learn faster together than apart. AI is already changing how medicines are discovered and developed, and its potential in our sector is enormous, but only with the right validation and regulation behind it.
Thank you to everyone who joined, and to SPBN. This was the first of several initiatives we plan to build together, including exchange and mentoring formats.
Welcome, FEBiotec
We are delighted to welcome FEBiotec, the Federación Española de Biotecnólogos, as YEBN’s newest institutional member, and our first based in Spain.
Since 2008, FEBiotec has given Spain’s biotechnologists a single, recognised voice, for professionals and students alike, with one of the country’s most active networking and outreach calendars: from the Biotech Annual Congress to regional meetings such as BioSouth and BioNorth. You have already seen what that means in practice. It was FEBiotec that opened the door to Talent Day at BIOSPAIN.
Bienvenidos, FEBiotec. We are glad to have you with us.
YEBN in European Biotechnology Magazine
Our growth made the page. The Autumn edition of European Biotechnology Magazine features YEBN expands to Spain and the Gulf, on FEBiotec joining as an institutional member and our new partnership with SPBN. You will find it on page 57.
Through our partnership with the magazine, the full Autumn edition is yours to read.
Save the date: YEBN turns 25
6–8 September 2027 · Barcelona Biomedical Research Park (PRBB), Barcelona
Mark your calendar. In 2027 YEBN turns 25, and we will celebrate it with the anniversary edition of BioConnect, co-organised with the Hospital del Mar Research Institute (HMRIB).
Three days bringing together senior figures from across biotech and the young European professionals coming up behind them. The programme, the call for participation and registration will follow here first. For now, keep the dates free.
Want to help build it? We are looking for volunteers to help organise the congress. Whether your thing is programme, partnerships, communications or making things run on the day, there is a role for you in the event that marks our first 25 years.
Volunteer for the 25th anniversary
Join the community
YEBN keeps growing, and there is room for you in it. Join as a member for €25 a year, or for free as an active volunteer shaping our events, partnerships and content.
Already part of one of our institutional member organisations? Your YEBN membership is free.
Membership now comes with the Opportunities Board, the members’ WhatsApp community and a seat in rooms like the ones above.