Picking Europe’s side?: Biopharma sovereignty in a fractured global order

The Brussels Institute for Geopolitics (BIG) hosted a closed-door breakfast roundtable on 26 March on the future of Europe’s biopharma sovereignty in an increasingly fractured global order.

The discussion brought together policymakers, industry representatives, investors and experts to reflect on a growing strategic question for Europe: how to preserve innovation, secure manufacturing capacity and ensure patient access at a time of mounting pressure from both the United States and China.

The exchange started from a shared concern that biopharma no longer features prominently enough in Europe’s political priorities, despite its importance for economic security, public health and long-term competitiveness. Participants argued that, as the memory of the pandemic recedes, Europe risks underestimating one of the domains in which it could still build meaningful strategic strength.

A recurring theme was that Europe now faces a ‘double shock’. On one side, US pricing and trade pressures are reshaping investment and launch decisions. On the other, China’s rise as a biopharma power is changing the global innovation landscape, with faster clinical development, growing scientific capacity and increasing international reach. Against that backdrop, participants discussed whether Europe has a sufficiently coherent response – and whether existing initiatives are adequate to the scale of the challenge.

Several speakers stressed that Europe’s main weakness remains fragmentation. The problem is not only regulatory complexity, but the wider gap between strategic ambition at EU level and the realities of 27 national healthcare and reimbursement systems. Participants noted that this fragmentation affects everything from market access and investment attractiveness to the speed with which innovations reach patients.

At the same time, Europe still has significant assets in biopharma, including its manufacturing base, research excellence, skilled workforce and rich health-data ecosystem. Participants also welcomed the EU Biotech Act as an important step, describing it as the first serious attempt in recent decades to develop a more strategic industrial approach to the sector – even if further action on market conditions and private investment will be needed.

Another important thread was the need to place biopharma more firmly within Europe’s broader economic security thinking. Participants discussed how to create more reliable markets for innovative products, how to align trade, industrial and health policy more effectively, and how to connect Brussels-level debate with political choices in member-state capitals. The roundtable also pointed to the importance of breaking out of narrow policy compartments, including by linking health more clearly to debates on security, data and strategic dependencies.

The conversation made clear that Europe still has choices to make. But it also underlined a growing sense that maintaining the status quo is no longer enough. If Europe wants to remain a serious biopharma actor, it will need to become more deliberate about where it seeks autonomy, how it creates markets, and which political trade-offs it is prepared to confront.