A third obstacle is the scarcity of specialised investors in the local market. Many traditional life science investors do not invest in companies with a heavy IT component, while typical IT investors tend to shy away from the healthcare sector.
Still, the European digital health and healthcare IT market is growing, with companies commercialising specialised digital healthcare products that target hospitals or other caregivers, helping them to improve their processes and logistics.
Some European investors have declared an interest in this space, and have started making investments, but it will likely take a few exemplary successful exits to really accelerate this sector in Europe.
Anne Portwich, PhD, is a partner of Life Science Partners (LSP) and Rudy Dekeyser, PhD, is managing partner of LSP’s Health Economics fund
