Gothenburg's National Offer of Multi-Cluster Collaboration
Steptura and Vectura are two sister companies in property development, each dedicated to creating specialized facilities where researchers, innovators, and companies can connect, collaborate, and drive forward advancements in innovation. Together, they lead the development and facilitation of GoCo Health Innovation City, Forskaren, The Loop, and additional innovation hubs across Sweden. This unique partnership is grounded in a shared vision: to establish a national ecosystem of Life Science clusters that drives health innovation and enhances Sweden's international competitiveness.
Nowhere is this vision more fully realized than at GoCo Health Innovation City in Gothenburg. Rapidly expanding and now home to over 90 companies, GoCo has established itself as one of the most dynamic innovation environments for Life Science talent. By fostering an ecosystem that integrates research, healthcare, academia, and industry, GoCo Health Innovation City provides a natural meeting ground for creative collaboration and new business opportunities.
Moa Dicksdotter, Head of Community at GoCo Health Innovation City, highlights GoCo's appeal to global actors: “Life Science is a global industry, and many companies are pursuing an international agenda. In many areas, the need for skills can be so specific that there is not a large enough recruitment base in Sweden, perhaps not even in the Nordic countries. Then the companies have to search for new talent globally. The next step will then be to convince talent to move here, whereupon attractive innovation environments become even more important. We provide such an environment.”
Creating Spaces for Innovation and Growth
Filippa Reinfeldt, Manager Business Development at Vectura, explains the vision behind the national Life Science network: “We create opportunities for innovation environments to grow. By developing attractive properties that foster collaboration among diverse stakeholders and creating settings with relevant content, we establish natural meeting spaces where creativity and innovation flourish. This attracts new talent to the area, which in turn drives further innovation and opens up new business opportunities.”
In addition, Reinfeldt emphasizes the importance of creating "common ground" to foster unexpected innovations: “We know that unexpected innovations and developments can be created between companies that might never have met had there not been any common ground for their collaboration. We create that common ground.”
National Reach through Strategic Locations: Forskaren and The Loop
In addition to GoCo, Sweden’s Life Science network extends to other strategic locations like Forskaren in Stockholm and The Loop in Lund, further strengthening the national offering. Forskaren in Stockholm’s Hagastaden provides a creative workspace for researchers, start-ups, and established companies alike which will soon be situated in an even larger context as Vectura is developing even more facilities and meeting spaces in the area. Meanwhile, The Loop in Lund promotes cross-border partnerships and collaboration, making it a crucial meeting ground for companies and academia within Life Science.
“For international actors, it may be of little interest whether the hub is located in Gothenburg, Lund or Stockholm. They are looking for a national meeting place in Sweden that can be their springboard to establish new collaborations here. Our aim is to continue developing our strongest Life Science clusters by providing the very best we can in terms of space, location, access, sustainability and not least, common meeting grounds” adds Filippa Reinfeldt.
