Life sciences sector in Slovakia through the eyes of its leaders: Not enough talent, not enough investment

Today, it is innovation and technological progress that sets the pace of society's development. The success of the life sciences sector is crucial for the future of health care, the economy, quality of life and the entire direction of Slovakia. We have considerable room for growth in this area and a lot of untapped talent. However, the key to success might be connecting innovators with growth capital, agreed scientists, investors and representatives of successful Slovak startups and life sciences companies during the event Life Sciences & Slovakia: Emerging Sector for the Upcoming Decades, which was organized by the American Chamber of Commerce in cooperation with Crowdberry.

Untapped talent

The outflow of human talent, or brain drain, is a frequently discussed topic in Slovakia, yet representatives of fast-growing companies in the life sciences sector – Pavol Čekan (CEO MultiplexDX), Eva Kováčová (CEO Glycanostics) and Michaela Šišková (CEO DNA ERA) – agree that there is no shortage of promising candidates.

"When we posted a new geneticist position, we had over 100 applications in two days!" Michaela Šišková from DNA ERA, a company that strives to make genetic testing accessible to everyone, summed up.

"Paradoxically, we have a literal glut of talent in Slovakia, but we still lack success stories of companies that would convince key partners that it is worth investing in them," added Pavol Čekan, CEO of MultiplexDX, a company mainly engaged in the development of fast and accurate diagnostic products for the detection of diseases such as breast cancer.

"From my point of view, we do not lack talent directly in the sciences, but in the infrastructure above that, in the so-called tech transfer sphere. We need people who understand the business environment, who can communicate with relevant companies, who are familiar with creating licensing agreements and so on,"