BIA update – 9 March 2026
With another milestone week behind us, we’ve been reflecting on the growing momentum around the Health Data Research Service (HDRS) and the incredible opportunity this presents for the UK. Last week brought valuable discussions with new HDRS CEO Melanie Ivarsson on priorities, including scaling of data depth and breadth to ensure our national data set is fit for future R&D needs, ensuring that a future joined-up HDRS delivers value back to the UK and fuels growth with access for SMEs, and learning from existing and past initiatives. We were also proud to deliver an All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for life sciences roundtable in Parliament, featuring Melanie Ivarsson and Professor Cathy Sudlow and highlighting the importance of health data with a wide range of parliamentarians.
Women in Biotech at Hinxton Hall provided another opportunity to share the current status of HDRS, with Melanie opening the conference and sharing ambitions for the new organisation – signalling bold leadership for the health data ecosystem. Great also to see the exciting and expansive plans for the Wellcome Genome Campus at Hinxton – future home of HDRS – and our hosts and supporters of Big WiB this year.
Jane Wall
Managing Director, BIA
HDRS in focus
It was great to focus on the HDRS last week, at what is such an exciting time for the initiative. We met with the new CEO, Melanie Ivarsson, to catch up on progress and discuss BIA’s priorities for the service. These include ensuring affordable access for SMEs, balancing the scaling of data depth and breadth and offering a certified Trusted Research Environment (TRE) system. We also attended the HDRS industry forum to discuss the brand identity of the service.
On Wednesday, we collaborated on an APPG for life sciences roundtable on HDRS, welcoming Melanie, Professor Cathie Sudlow (author of the landmark Sudlow Review), and Tamsin Morris (AZ) to parliament to raise awareness of the importance of health data. We were joined by Kit Malthouse MP, Steve Yemm MP, Sadik Al-Hassan MP and Lord Bethell to discuss our shared ambitions for HDRS. The enthusiasm for patient impact was inspiring.
Celebrating women in biotech
As we approached International Women’s Day last Sunday, I reflected on the incredible energy at Hinxton Hall, Cambridge, last week. An audience of 250+ gathered for our ‘Big WiB’ Women in Biotech 2026 event: a full day celebrating the brilliance of our community in a completely sold-out event that proves the appetite for connection and high-calibre thought-leadership in our community has never been stronger.
The theme for IWD 2026 is Rights, Justice, Action, and awareness of the fragility of those rights and the need to press ahead against the headwinds was strong throughout the day.
I shared a sobering update from our latest Women in biotech leadership report. The headline? The dial has moved just 0.4% in 12 months. With female CEO representation stalling at 18.7%, growth has officially hit a plateau.
In a highly risk-averse market, we are seeing a boardroom retrenchment. Boards are falling back on ‘known’ management teams, and in the critical private, pre-clinical stage, female NED representation has dropped to just 9%. This is a global "structural cap" that we cannot afford to ignore. However, beneath this plateau, there is a story of extraordinary defiance.
From US policy and changing global political rhetoric on DEI, how to lead companies through change, and the challenge and opportunity in women’s health. From the launch of the Health Data Research Service, tissue biology through the lens of women’s health and lessons in leadership. Our panels and keynotes ranged widely and insightfully through the day with so many great anecdotes, lived experience, advice, thought-provoking challenges and calls to action – alongside a good deal of laughter, networking and cocktails. It really struck home how incredibly resilient, inspirational and determined our speakers, panellists and audience proved to be. Thank you to all of you for your time, your wisdom and your energy.
The event was a sell-out, and we encourage you to book early for our future events to avoid disappointment!
Coming up next is the inaugural BioSolutions UK conference, taking place on 21 April 2026 in London, followed by Start-up Festival on 21 May, Life Science Leadership Summit on 8-9 June, Summer Party on 2 July, TechBio UK on 13 October and bioProcessUK on 17-19 November.
Community Connects
It was great to convene our diverse membership at Community Connects: Regulatory and Access meets BioSolutions, where the Regulatory Affairs and Engineering Biology advisory committees joined for an engaging session on engineering biology regulation. This month, we will also be hosting our Cell and Gene Therapy, Manufacturing, TechBio, IP and Finance and tax Communities in similarly exciting, collaborative forums – so do get in touch with Jaime Eaton if you are interested!
Lab bench to front bench: focus on Regulatory and Access
February was another one of those months where the international political mood shifted day by day, in turn impacting the domestic political landscape. It’s no easy task staying on top of events through the prism of potential impact on the sector, which is why we have launched a monthly policy briefing. Today sees the publication of the second instalment of Lab bench to front bench, where you can keep an eye on the BIA policy team’s latest activity. The latest edition also features a deep dive from Rosie Lindup on the evolution of our regulatory work.
The byelection win for the Green Party means there’s a new face in Parliament for BIA to meet, whom we managed to meet on only her third day. We are closely monitoring what this victory means for shifting voter priorities and the increasing complexity of consensus-building in today’s political environment. With continuing chaos in broader geopolitics, staying close to the machinery of government to keep life science sector priorities at the top of the government’s mind matters more than ever. As we move through advisory committee season, we are especially grateful for the insight, expertise and engagement of our members, whose support underpins the work we do.
Spring statement
We were pleased to find no new policy or surprises for the life sciences sector in the Chancellor’s Spring Statement, where Rachel Reeves MP appealed to an electorate feeling the pinch and stressed the stability of the UK to the bond markets. She did, however, promise to “go further in backing innovation and harnessing the power of AI,” but did not expand on it beyond this.
More member wins roll in!
Theolytics, which develops next-generation oncolytic immunotherapies, has been awarded (pending final negotiation) €8 million in non-dilutive grant funding from Horizon Europe 2025, the European Union’s flagship research and innovation funding programme. The grant to Theolytics will provide significant financial support to advance the company’s Phase 2 OCTOPOD-IV clinical trial evaluating THEO-260, its novel therapeutic candidate designed to address unmet needs in patients with advanced ovarian cancer.
And Outpost Bio, a company decoding the hidden interactions that drive human biology, announced a $3.5 million pre-seed funding round co-led by Merantix Capital and Seedcamp. The funding will accelerate Outpost Bio’s experimental and modelling platforms, unlocking new ways to design drug ingredients and consumer health products.
Last call: join the UK Pavilion at BIO 2026
For those looking to fly the flag for UK innovation on the global stage, today is the final day to register your expression of interest for the UK Pavilion at the BIO International Convention 2026 in San Diego (22-25 June).
The Department for Business and Trade (DBT) is looking for innovative life science companies to exhibit within the pavilion, which serves as a central hub for the UK’s four nations. Exhibiting provides a dedicated branded space to hold meetings and access to BIO’s online partnering system, essential for a meeting that draws 20,000 global delegates. The deadline is today, Monday 9 March; please register your interest to ensure your business is part of the UK’s international presence this summer.