CEO blog: Summertime lull? Not for UK biotech or BIA…

Dear colleagues,

As with many things in this hot summer, the sector ran at full speed into August. A new brand of government and a flurry of announcements from biotech, manufacturing, trials and mega-pharma have us active and alert.

So far, August has not disappointed in sector news. Whether you are on the beach or in the boardroom, keep your antennae on full power. In this issue, we cover new pension scale-up fund news, member news from Touchlight, the major GSK investment in Cambridge and a valuable collaboration for Relation. Add to that a review of our full-on parliamentary activity in July.

With that holiday reading done, we look forward to the next season of events and share a heads-up on the Budget. Whilst there is momentum, we recognise that times are still tough for many in the community across biotechs and the service sector. That drives us all at BIA to keep pushing on behalf of our members.

In this update:

• UK pension giants unlock £1 billion
• Touchlight doses first patient with proprietary vaccine
• Relation makes multi-million pound deal with GSK
• GSK invests in Cambridge
• Member-only briefing and webinar
• Latest Lab bench to front bench
• Look ahead to London Life Sciences Week

UK pension giants unlock £1 billion for innovation

A very welcome development was announced last week as some of the UK’s largest pension providers announced plans to explore a first-of-its-kind UK Scale-up Fund, designed to back the best growth opportunities emerging from British science and technology.

This is not just good news for founders and early-stage investors. By investing in successful UK companies, including biotech, pension providers can deliver strong long-term returns for savers, while supporting the wider economy and helping more value created by UK innovation stay in the UK.

It is also encouraging to see the British Business Bank working alongside the pension providers, with the intention of investing in partnership with the group, and the Office for Investment supporting the consortium as it develops the fund.

Touchlight doses first patient in landmark clinical trial

Congratulations to BIA member Touchlight, which has delivered a landmark moment for UK personalised medicine: the first UK patient dosed with a bespoke cancer vaccine, manufactured using its proprietary dbDNA technology.

This vaccine is designed to match the unique genetics of an individual tumour, giving the immune system a uniquely precise target. This first patient has advanced lung cancer that has only partially responded to standard immunotherapy, and the hope is that this vaccine will help the immune system better recognise, seek out and attack tumour cells.

It is exactly the kind of progress we want to see more of: cutting-edge UK science moving from promise into UK patients using UK manufacturing.

Relation makes multi-million pound deal with GSK

It was also good to see two BIA members, Relation and GSK, announce a strategic research collaboration. This is another great deal for the UK sector, demonstrating the world-class value of our pioneering technology. The deal could be worth up to $110 million for Relation.

The partnership will generate large-scale human cellular perturbation data and put it to work in advanced models, including MORGAN, Relation’s cellular biology foundation model. In essence, it is about improving the industry’s understanding of disease biology and finding better routes to new therapeutic targets.

GSK makes big investment in Cambridge

We welcome the news that GSK will invest £400 million to move its R&D centre from Stevenage to a new Cambridge site by 2029. At the same time, the landmark Stevenage facility represents a major opportunity to build on what is already one of the country's most established and successful life sciences clusters, with strong links to both London and Cambridge.

Meanwhile we hope the site can be redeveloped as a hive of biotechs and scientific services providers, following the transformation of former pharmaceutical sites such as Alderley Park.

This takes vision and money but offers the opportunity to strengthen an already-thriving ecosystem, leveraging decades of investment and providing a cluster that protects high-value jobs, attracts international investment and nurtures the next generation of GSKs.

Member-only Andy Burnham briefing and webinar

BIA members can soon expect an exclusive briefing in their inboxes once the ministerial briefs are published and can tune in to tune in to our webinar on Wednesday 5 August to hear full details. Members can also read our exclusive analysis of what Andy Burnham’s approach means for UK life sciences.

A Budget date of 28 October has been set. We are already preparing our focussed pushes into this pivotal set of government decisions and we will be communicating closely with our members through the autumn.

Latest Lab bench to front bench out now

Check out the latest edition of Lab bench to front bench, where our policy team reviews July’s engagement with Government and Parliament in the first weeks of the Burnham premiership.

July’s update covers how BIA is pressing for policy continuity through the transition, holding government to account on the Life Sciences Sector Plan, and making the case for stronger support on scale-up finance, skills, clinical trials, health data and regulation.

London Life Sciences Week to be better than ever

LLSW 2026 is going at full pace and is set to be bigger and better this year than ever. We at BIA will be co-hosting the opening event, Welcome to London, and running an enlarged investor event in November.

LLSW 2026 is again delivered by us with London & Partners. It will bring the global life sciences community to London from 15–20 November, with more than 80 events and with over 1,300 investors and 5,000 attendees expected across the week including a number of strategic delegations.