Go fund a brain gain

Last month, European Union (EU) Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced a new $560 million package in the next two years to make Europe a “magnet for researchers.” The money is intended to “support the best and the brightest researchers and scientists from Europe and around the world.” The seven-year ‘super grants’ will be complemented by several other national and regional initiatives to support US researchers. Though the amount is not close to replacing the $2.3 billion that has already been cut from US National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant funding since the beginning of the year, Europe’s funders have a unique opportunity to establish a foothold in several key biotech research areas, such as mRNA vaccines, and several other areas being deprioritized by the US administration.

NIH funding is foundational to US biotech innovation, and as much as 99% of all drugs approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) between 2010 and 2019 have relied in part on this funding — an average of $600 million of NIH funds per approval. In 2023 alone, one estimate cites NIH funding as responsible for an estimated $92.89 billion in economic impact, with every $100 million spent projected to generate $598 million in further biomedical R&D.

Since taking office in January, the Trump administration has proposed drastic cuts to NIH funding. The proposed agency budget shrinks 2025’s $48.5 billion budget to $27 billion, with a 15% cap on indirect costs for extramural grants to academic institutions, including administrative overhead, expenses and maintenance of facilities (previously these comprised upward of 50% extra on top of grants). Although the legality of these cuts remain unclear — in April, a federal judge issued a permanent injunction on the plan — their impact in chilling US biomedical research cannot be overstated. At institutions, researchers are uncertain whether continuing work will be funded, whether existing staff can be retained, and whether new job offers can be honored.

Across the Atlantic, the European Union (EU) and national governments, state and regional authorities and institutions have been responding. In March, Aix-Marseille University in France launched the ‘Safe Place for Science’ initiative, allocating ~$17 million to sponsor 15 researchers working on health, the environment and social sciences. They received almost 300 applications. This morphed into the larger ‘Choose Europe for Science’ program announced by President van der Leyen. In May, the European Research Council announced it was doubling the amount of grant funding available to researchers wishing to relocate to Europe. Several other national grant bodies have also offered additional funding¹ to researchers coming from the United States.

Europe’s move towards this opportunity is not unexpected: since US President Joe Biden’s executive order on advancing biotech and biomanufacturing innovation in 2022, the European Commission has proposed its own EU Biotech Act, calling for Europe to speed technology transfer and biomanufacturing, simplify regulatory and market landscapes, and scale investment. Last December, a new team of commissioners took office, with a focus on supporting industry and small companies and putting research and innovation at the center of the economy. Policies are still in early stages of implementation, but they have been enacted quickly, and a number of projects are in the works in the European Innovation Council and beyond².

As yet, however, the amounts of money offered are limited compared with the crater in US funding. In 2024, the European Commission devoted just $14 billion to research and innovation, including $13 billion for Horizon Europe — the European Union’s seven-year research and innovation funding program, which started in 2021. Horizon Europe has a total budget of $97 billion for 2021–2027. To be competitive with US or Chinese R&D expenditures, the EU’s overall R&D budget would need to double by 2028.

Perhaps, then, it makes sense for European funders to be strategic about where they focus their smaller funding bucket. In particular, European biotech would benefit from doubling down on areas of biomedical innovation being hollowed out in the United States. One promising area of innovative research is mRNA vaccines and therapeutics^3,4. In BioNTech, which co-developed the COVID-19 mRNA vaccine, Europe has a flagship company around which to change the narrative. There are several other European mRNA pioneers as well. Human testing of personalized mRNA vaccines for bladder cancer, lung cancer and ovarian cancer represents an ambitious step in bringing this new modality to patients with recalcitrant cancers. In February, published results from a trial of BioNTech’s personalized mRNA vaccine in pancreatic cancer showed durable induction of T cell immunity, with a three-year delay in recurrence⁵. Last month, the UK government announced it was infusing $171 million over 10 years into establishment of an R&D hub with the company.

Turning Europe into a powerhouse for driving personalized mRNA vaccines into medical practice by supporting clinical development and regulatory oversight is a very achievable goal. And beyond mRNA technology, other areas under attack — women’s health and sustainable energy — represent other opportunities for focused European investment.

It’s too early to say what the potential cuts to US biomedical research will mean to biotech. There have been rough periods before. Market collapse and a glacial financing environment, compounded by the hollowing out of FDA staff and a devaluation of scientific research, have so far been met with conspicuous silence from industry leadership. Perhaps this is the time for Europe to finally step up and show it can also be a burgeoning center for industry growth. With Europe’s quick actions to take on US-based talent and the momentum from policies already in place and growing, there is much to be gained. Growth will require alignment of governing bodies, policies and regulation, as well as targeted strategies for bringing technologies to market, and it will only happen if European funders first prioritize research areas and then inject financing into them on a scale commensurate to that previously seen in the United States and China.