Lisbon, Feb. 2, 2021 (Lusa) - The president of BioNTech, Uğur Şahin, on Tuesday advocated the need to create a "research and development ecosystem" linking Europe and bringing research, academic research, industry and connective innovation together.
"We need to develop a research and development ecosystem that connects Europe but also connects Europe to the rest of the world," he said.
The German entrepreneur was speaking at an international online conference organised by the Portuguese presidency of the Council of the European Union (EU) on the prospect of how the Horizon Europe programme, presented today, can help mobilise synergies in the eradication of pandemics and the development of new biomedical materials and systems.
Uğur Şahin said that innovation cycles would be "much shorter" in the future, which makes it necessary "to obtain knowledge very quickly" given that "scientific biology can enable us to use and act on this knowledge", pointing to the development of the Covid-19 vaccine as an example.
The president of BioNTech said it was "crucial" to bring together the ecosystems of research, academic research, industry and collaborative innovation to generate new knowledge.
He also stressed the importance of the European Commission's research programmes, which he had benefited from since 2001 when he created the biotechnology BioNTech, which developed a vaccine against Covid-19 in partnership with Pfizer, a "feat that is due to the verified research ecosystem".
BioNTech has been involved in a controversy with the European Union (EU) following production problems that have delayed delivery of the doses stipulated in contracts with the European Commission.
However, last Monday 1 February, the German company announced that it would supply EU countries with an additional 75 million doses of its Covid-19 vaccine developed with Pfizer in the second quarter of the year after improving production processes.
This supply is part of the EU's second order of 200 million doses, which was scheduled for later. The company now says it will accelerate and deliver in the second quarter after improving production capacity.
The EU, which ordered 600 million doses of this vaccine, has been criticised for ordering vaccines too late and in insufficient quantities from several companies.
JAYG/ADB // ADB.
Lusa
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