Life Science Talent Talks

Jacob Doktor Mogensen, CEO of Incuba, joins the show to unpack how Aarhus's science park model turns university research into scaled companies.
The conversation moves from Incuba's problem-first, hands-on approach to acceleration, through real cases like Coana and CrowdStrike/Humio, to the harder question of why Danish companies sell out to international capital - and what "spinning in" corporate innovation could change. Listeners get a grounded look at what actually moves a startup from idea to exit.

Episode Timestamps
(09:37) Concrete support: financing, applications, introductions
(10:49) The Investor Hub: proximity that closes deals
(27:26) Success story: Quana's journey and US sale
(41:39) Defining "spin-in" innovation
(46:14) Spin-in success story: CrowdStrike and Humio
(50:01) Turning company problems into student projects
(55:00) Aarhus' innovation ecosystem over the next 10 years

Guest Bio
Jacob Doktor Mogensen is CEO of Incuba, the Aarhus-based science park connecting university spin-outs, established companies, and investors across three hubs. Before Incuba, he spent fifteen years in Danish innovation clusters and science parks, including time in the food industry.

Resources Mentioned
Incuba (Incuba.dk) — science park hubs at Katrinebjerg, Navitas, and Skejby
Incuba on LinkedIn
Coana — Aarhus University spin-out and EU Horizon-funded case study
CrowdStrike / Humio acquisition
Delfinus Venture Capital
InnoFonden, InnoBooster, Horizon Europe funding programs
Startup Aarhus
Aarhus Investor Summit (October 8)

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In this podcast episode on turning fragmented world-class research into a connected biosolutions ecosystem, host Søren Spanner Bach is joined by guest Andreas Worberg, the driving force behind the new Center for Biosolutions at DTU (Technical University of Denmark) - a cross-departmental initiative uniting eight departments and close to 2,000 researchers under DTU's non-medical biotechnology efforts.
Andreas shares candid reflections on why DTU, despite ranking as Europe's best engineering university and fifth in the world for biotech, has struggled to make that strength visible and legible to industry, policymakers, and the public - and what the new center is doing to fix it.
Key structural challenges discussed include the internal fragmentation of a large polytechnical university where departments rarely know what their neighbours are working on, a publication-driven incentive structure that pushes researchers toward papers over spin-outs, and years of specialised equipment sitting underused in campus vaults due to legal and liability hurdles around sharing it. Andreas also reflects on the trust-building work required to make collaboration feel like an opportunity rather than a threat to a researcher's own career and turf.
Andreas draws a striking comparison to the arrival of ChatGPT, arguing biotechnology is nearing its own inflection point as AI, quantum computing, and biotech converge - and cautions that businesses investing heavily in AI and quantum while overlooking biotech may be missing where the next wave of disruption actually lands. His closing message: DTU has been playing the long game in biosolutions for years, and now, with a center to make that work visible, Denmark's biosolutions ecosystem is ready to be discovered.

⏱️ TIMESTAMPS
04:26 Why Biology Is the Next Manufacturing Platform
10:11 Why Commercialization Boosts a Researcher's Academic Footprint
28:06 Closing the Non-Medical Biotech Innovation Gap
32:57 Papers vs. Spin-Outs: You Get What You Measure
34:28 The Biosustain Lesson: Freedom Breeds Entrepreneurs
53:00 The Innovation Pillar: Learning From MIT's Playbook
57:06 Student-Driven Startups vs. Top-Down Innovation

💡 QUOTES
"Large diverse universities... have the challenge that often the right hand does not necessarily know what the left hand is doing." — Andreas

Links:
https://biosolutions.dtu.dk/

Guest Bio
Andreas trained as a biologist, with a doctorate in Germany spanning botany and molecular biology. He spent ten years at a large German engineering company, where he helped design, build, and operate large-scale biochemical plants as its first biologist. He joined DTU in 2017, spending eight years at DTU Biosustain, and today also connects non-medical biotech to defense applications through NATO.

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In this podcast episode on turning research into societal value, host Søren Spanner Bach is joined by co-host Per Christensen of Black Swans Exist and guest Morten Engsbye, CEO of Danish BIO (Dansk Biotek) - the industry association representing over 190 pharmaceutical and industrial biotech companies in Denmark. Morten shares candid reflections on why Denmark, despite being Europe's #2 nation for per-capita life sciences publications, consistently underperforms at translating that world-class research into new companies - and what it will take to fix it.
Key structural challenges discussed include the cultural gap between academic excellence and entrepreneurial ambition, the scarcity of early-stage capital as late-stage companies attract the lion's share of investment, and Denmark's 42% capital gains tax making biotech investment unattractive compared to property or neighbouring Sweden. In a world premiere, Morten also unveils Danish BIO's proposal for direct cash grants to university departments that successfully spin out companies - a mechanism designed to make innovation a leadership priority at department level, not just an individual pursuit.
Morten also sounds the alarm on Denmark's GDP dependency on a small number of blockbuster drugs - life sciences now accounts for approximately 60% of all Danish GDP growth - and makes a compelling case for unlocking the country's 4.5 trillion DKK in pension fund assets, currently investing just 0.018% into venture compared to 1.9% in the US. His closing message: Denmark is a life sciences nation in every metric that matters. It just hasn't realised it yet.

TIMESTAMP
00:00 Morten Engsbye and Danish BIO
02:00 The Translation Gap: World-Class Research, Not Enough Companies
03:00 Why Other Countries Are Better at Spinning Out Science
06:00 World Premiere: Danish BIO's Department-Level Spin-Out Incentive Proposal
09:00 Freedom vs Mandates: Why Incentives Beat Obligations
11:00 Genmab, Myelomatosis & What Biotech Success Really Looks Like
13:00 The GDP Time Bomb: When Patents Expire, Markets Collapse
17:00 The Capital Crisis: $2.1 Billion to Bring a Drug to Market
19:00 A Schizophrenic Capital Market: Late-Stage Flush, Early-Stage Starved
20:00 Where Should the Capital Come From? The Draghi & Letta Reports
21:00 Capital Gains Tax: 42% in Denmark vs 27% in Sweden
23:00 Pension Funds: 4.5 Trillion DKK Doing Very Little for Denmark
24:00 The 100x Gap: US vs European Pension Funds in Venture
26:00 Ferrari vs Denmark: One Fund's Investment Priorities
29:00 Forcing vs Incentivising Pension Funds: The Italian Model
30:00 Why It Should Be a Slam Dunk — Jobs, Patients, Returns
34:00 Denmark as a Life Sciences Nation — and Why Politicians Don't See It
36:00 Call to Action for Academics and Department Leaders
40:00 Brain Drain: How Danish Taxpayer-Funded Research Ends Up in Boston

Quote:
"We pay for the research. They build the company here. Then, because there's no capital market, they leave for Boston — pay their taxes there, create all the jobs there. And we sit back holding the bill." — Morten Engsbye

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Call to Action
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Share it with someone working in science, startups, or innovation
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In this episode, Luuk van der Wielen, Head of BRIGHT (Novo Nordisk Foundation Biotechnology Research Institute for the Green Transition), joins Søren Spanner Bach and Per Christensen from Black Swans Exist in collaboration with Life Science Talent Talks to unpack what it will take for Europe to turn biotech innovation into real, sustainable economic value.
Luuk introduces BRIGHT's core mission: helping Europe reduce emissions, strengthen resource autonomy, and build a more resilient industrial base - not through isolated breakthroughs, but through the kind of system-level change that reshapes technology, supply chains, regulation, incentives, and social behavior all at once.
The conversation draws on powerful historical precedents - Brazil's Proálcool biofuel program and Denmark's biogas infrastructure - to illustrate why lasting green transitions are never built on a single "silver bullet" product, but on coordinated, long-term ecosystem thinking.
Luuk also shares how BRIGHT itself is evolving: moving beyond its Biosustain roots and a science-and-startup model toward more open public-private collaboration, scenario-based "reverse design" roadmaps anchored in 2050 goals, and impact-focused KPIs that go well beyond publications and patents.
The episode explores BRIGHT's three strategic focus areas - sustainable materials, microbial and sustainable foods, and zero-emission agriculture - and what it means to build research infrastructure that is measured by real-world outcomes.
Finally, Luuk issues a direct invitation to potential partners and makes a compelling case for deeper European collaboration and a fairer, continent-wide level playing field for biotech innovation.

⏱️ TIMESTAMP

00:00 Series Kickoff
00:36 Meet Pierre and Black Swans
01:13 Luuk’s Career Journey
04:03 What BRIGHT Does
06:28 Innovation for Green Transition
06:51 Brazil’s Biofuel Lesson
08:52 Systems Change Not Silver Bullets
10:20 BRIGHT’s Origin Story
11:56 From Startups to Partnerships
13:22 Biogas to High Value Proteins
16:04 Key Ingredients for Collaboration
17:42 Sustainable Innovation Office
18:22 Reverse Designing the Roadmap
20:28 Scenario Planning and Outreach
21:37 Tech Plus Policy and Society
22:33 Policy Targets and Autonomy
24:02 Biogas Infrastructure Strategy
26:40 Future Scenarios and Innovations
30:00 Impact Metrics in Academia
34:47 Europe Collaboration and Equity
38:03 Ecosystem Gaps and Level Playing Field
39:48 Bright Partnerships and Missions

💡 Quote:
"Innovation is important in the systems change, but also the regulatory system, the financial system. You don't solve it with one super plastic that comes from BioSolutions. You have to look at the total systems change." - Luuk van der Wielen

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Call to Action
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In this podcast episode on turning research into societal value, host Søren is joined by co-host Per Christensen of Black Swans Exist and guest Jesper Grønbæk, CEO and founder of the nonprofit Health Tech Hub Copenhagen (supported by the Danish Industry Foundation and the Novo Nordisk Foundation). Jesper shares key learnings from supporting 100+ health tech startups and scale-ups, as well as collaborating with hospitals, pharma, insurers, and a 200+ investor network - including enabling hospital “speed-dating” access in markets like Germany.
Key pitfalls discussed include solving “nice-to-have” problems instead of top-priority hospital needs, failing to secure an influential key opinion leader early, starting fundraising too late while overlooking non-dilutive “soft money” grants, and lacking commercial traction due to staying overly project-focused. He emphasizes the importance of early investor relationship-building, being selective with investors, and maintaining a strong commercial focus - sometimes even launching below MDR/CE-mark requirements first.
Jesper also introduces the upcoming Health Tech Pathways platform, which uses expert-trained AI to guide EU MDR medical device regulation and improve documentation quality - ultimately reducing the time and cost associated with today’s multi-year EU processes.

TIMESTAMP

00:42 Meet Health Tech Hub
01:47 Ecosystem Connections
02:47 Hospital Access Speed Dating
03:50 Why Jesper Started
05:42 Healthcare Pressure Ahead
06:23 Mistake One Nice to Have
08:43 Key Opinion Leaders
10:12 Mistake Two Fundraising
10:53 Soft Money and Accelerators
12:14 Choosing Investors Wisely
14:48 Mistake Three Commercial Traction
16:42 Traction Under Regulation
18:18 Consumers Paying for Health Apps
19:14 Who Pays for Health Tech
19:56 Building Health Tech Pathways
21:27 MDR Explained and Risk Classes
22:38 Why EU Approval Takes Longer
23:50 Ideal Users and Early Strategy
24:32 Plain English Plus Compliance
26:56 AI Powered Regulatory Guidance
27:38 Cutting Time with Better Docs
28:31 Ecosystem Wishlist Reimbursement
30:33 Community Call to Collaborate
31:30 Denmark Strengths and Next Steps

Quote:

"Finding a co-founder is like finding a spouse — it's somebody you want to work with for a very long time in a harsh environment." — Jesper

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Call to Action
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Share it with someone working in science, startups, or innovation
Follow the miniseries for more conversations with ecosystem builders