The conference stay for the center part started with a pre-event at the Norwegian Embassy in Denmark. Here we heard presentations about early funding of Nordic biotechnology companies, and were given the opportunity to meet representatives from Nordic investors, industry and management. Representatives from the Norwegian Embassy in Sweden visited the conference the next day and spent time talking with the Norwegian delegates. Having an engaged Norwegian Foreign Service is important in providing good support for international cooperation and the development of the sector. DLN expressed our wishes for the kind of support we would consider valuable from the embassy and we are looking forward to further dialogue on how we can promote Nordic cooperation together.
The exhibition area were one of the conference's main venues. This year, DLN participated in a joint stand “Norway for Life Science” together with several other key players in the Norwegian life science sector. This proved very useful as this gathered Norwegian initiatives that largely work for the same. There was good atmosphere at the stand and it was well visited throughout the conference. The feedback from visitors was very positive, and several were impressed with how it was possible to gather such a large group of players into a joint stand.
Some of what our Nordic neighboring countries are currently interested in, and which can also be seen in the debate at home, is to extract the values from our health records. DLN had a good discussion with Finnish colleagues who to look at the possibility of establishing a common approval and access regime for the use of health records across the Nordic countries. This will make it possible to combine the records in the least bureaucratic manner, which is especially valuable if you work with rare diseases. By looking at the entire population of the Nordic region there will be more cases to study. DLN believes that such an organization will increase the value of all our health records, and allow for a unique form of coordination between Nordic countries.
DLN was represented on the joint stand “Norway for Life Science” together with other important actors from the Norwegian life science community. From left: Kjetil Tasken (Group Leader - Innovation and Industry Involvement), Alexandra Patriksson (Coordinator - Innovation and Industry Involvement), Marie H. Aune (Centre Coordinator).
Overall, many important elements were gathered at this conference: A present and interested foreign service, collaboration across organizations with overlapping goals and last but not least engaged people with will and ability to help lift the Nordic region as a pioneer in health innovation.
