A European founder targeting the US market shouldn't dismiss European VCs. You might be the top priority in a European firm's portfolio, receiving more attention and support than you would as a lower-priority deal for a top-tier, oversubscribed Silicon Valley firm.

The UK produces world-class academic discovery but struggles to create scalable biotechs. The primary reason is a lack of venture capital with an appetite for the inherent risks of life sciences, forcing promising UK innovations to move to the US to secure funding.

The huge funding gap for European biotech is structural. European institutional investors like pension funds allocate only 0.02% of their balance sheets to venture, compared to 2% in the US. This factor-of-100 difference creates a major hurdle for the ecosystem's ability to retain its champion companies.

Europe generates scientific output and IP comparable to the US but fails to translate it into successful companies at the same rate. Key challenges include a lack of deep capital markets, a lower cultural risk appetite, and a smaller talent pool, pushing many promising European biotechs to seek funding and IPOs in the US.

The US biotech ecosystem thrives because failure is viewed as a valuable learning experience. In contrast, European culture often penalizes entrepreneurs from failed startups, creating a more risk-averse environment that stifles innovation and limits the pool of experienced operators who are willing to try again.

Unlike their US counterparts, European biotechs have less access to large venture funds. This forces a culture of extreme capital efficiency and discipline. This need to be "cleverer, smarter with less people and less money" is a defining feature and potential advantage of the European ecosystem.

Despite discussions of European self-reliance, its capital markets remain inadequate for scaling biotech companies. Over the past 10 years, only three biotechs managed to raise over €100 million in an IPO on a European exchange, compared to 27 European biotechs that achieved this on NASDAQ in the same period.

To remain globally competitive against the US and China, European biotech should focus on its core strength: high-quality, innovative early-stage science. The speaker suggests that while Europe excels at invention, scaling companies still requires tapping into the US market, capital, and talent, positioning Europe as a premier origination hub.

Europe's strong science is often held back by a lack of serial entrepreneurs, difficulty in raising follow-on funding, and a localized competitive view. Curie.Bio’s model directly counters these issues by providing an experienced drug-making team, a clear funding path, and an embedded global market perspective.