Medicon Village, in Lund, southern Sweden, is part of a cluster of life science research and development, together with actors such as the European Spallation Source (ESS), the BioMedical Centre (BMC) at Lund University and the Max IV Laboratory.
Medicon Village is divided into two companies – Medicon Village Fastighets AB and Medicon Village Innovation AB. Both companies are fully owned by the Mats Paulsson Foundation for Research, Innovation and Societal Development. The terms of the Foundation stipulate that any surplus must be re-invested into research and innovation.
On the campus, there are more than 2,800 colleagues in more than 180 organizations and companies. The village is home to the health chain from prevention and diagnostics to treatment and care. Researchers and companies there are active within cancer, diabetes, respiratory and lung diseases as well as inflammatory diseases.
The beginning of the village came from what could have been a disaster. In March 2010, AstraZeneca, the global biopharmaceutical company, announced that it was closing its research facilities in Lund and moving to another part of Sweden. This left 80,000 m² of real estate vacant. However, there was a happy ending as Medicon Village emerged, and has become a huge – and growing – success for the Skåne region.
Labiotech had the opportunity to visit the village recently, and spoke with the Innovation CEO, Petter Hartman.