In healthcare, open innovation is becoming essential, as challenges grow, working together across fields and regions makes all the difference.
In a demanding field like healthcare, innovation can no longer happen in silos. Faced with major challenges – an ageing population, chronic diseases and unequal access to care – open innovation and approaches that promote broader cooperation among various actors in healthcare have become essential. They bring together organisations with complementary expertise and roles: public and private, industrial and academic. When this collaboration crosses regional borders, its impact grows even stronger.
In Wallonia, Belgium, one initiative helping to foster this kind of collaboration is BioWin’s Innovation Lab. It brings together startups, research institutions, companies, hospitals, universities and other partners to explore new ideas and technologies through strategic partnerships. By leveraging collective intelligence and combining diverse knowledge, participants can co-create value and explore new ways to fuel innovation.
Let’s take a closer look at a few highlights from the Innovation Lab of April 2025, organised with the support of the Agence du Numérique.
The Lab focused on one of the most pressing challenges in healthcare today: data. The topic was chosen by BioWin for its strategic relevance across the health ecosystem. Data now plays a central role in transforming healthcare. It is essential for improving treatments, understanding diseases better and creating more targeted solutions. This data-driven approach shapes every step, from research and development to production and patient care.
Among the participating companies, IBA – a major name in nuclear medicine in Wallonia – shows how data is fast becoming a powerful force for transformation.
“Smart use of data opens new ways to optimise our technologies, anticipate clinical needs and increase the impact of our innovations in the sector,” says Julie Pilate, Group Funding Lead at IBA.
Wallonia and Luxembourg are two neighbouring regions with different strengths that complement each other. Luxembourg, with its MeluXina supercomputer run by LuxProvide, has strong expertise in secure data processing, which is crucial in patient data management, while Wallonia offers a complete health value chain supported by experienced organisations.
“Taking part in the Innovation Lab gave me the chance to meet committed partners from Wallonia, from both academia and industry. With LuxProvide, we explored concrete opportunities around artificial intelligence in healthcare. Initiatives like this create real synergies and foster ambitious, long-term cross-border collaboration,” says Dr Alban Rousset, Business Development Executive & Scientific Advisor at LuxProvide.
This dynamic also draws in companies like Antleron, which are looking to build cross-regional collaborations that support the development of next-generation therapies. Wallonia, through the ATMP-PIT initiative – a project aimed at consolidating the advanced therapy value chain in the region – is cultivating a fertile environment where science, innovation, and production capabilities converge to support integrated development efforts.
“Wallonia’s commitment to advanced therapies as a strategic health priority sends a clear message to innovation-focused companies like Antleron. The region’s vibrant ecosystem, its access to cutting-edge research, and its openness to collaborative innovation make it an ideal setting for fully integrated partnerships,” says Jan Schrooten, CEO of Antleron.
Collaborative innovation must include those on the ground, especially hospitals. As the final users of most developed solutions, their involvement makes sure that projects are realistic, tested in real care settings and based on actual needs.
“Our structured innovation strategy encourages ideas from all our experts. We want to bring our challenges together with those of universities, industry, and civil society to develop more integrated solutions,” says Marlène Frère-Jean, Strategic Development, Research & Innovation Advisor at EpiCURA Hospital.
However, hospitals are still not fully included in the innovation ecosystem. One reason is that they are not officially recognised as full partners under the Walloon Decree of 3 July 2008 on support for research, development and innovation. This limits their ability to access public funding for collaborative projects. BioWin believes this needs to change. Updating the decree would help hospitals take part more actively in innovation, work alongside companies and researchers and bring valuable on-the-ground insight into the development of new health solutions.
This also calls for a bottom-up approach, where healthcare professionals are not just participants but drivers of innovation. A strong example is Baby Detect, a project launched in Liège to allow early screening for 165 serious diseases in newborns. It combines clear clinical value with strong potential for public health.
“We’re here first and foremost to meet with hospitals. They are the ones who can bring Baby Detect to life by integrating it into newborn care,” explains Aymeric Harmant, CEO of Thameus, the spin-off created by Liège University Hospital to promote Baby Detect.
On 5 February 2026, BioWin, Biovia and lifetech.brussels will co-organise Health on Stage for the second time. At this reverse pitching event, hospitals and other care organisations will take the stage to share the challenges they face. The goal is to connect them with companies that can help develop practical, useful solutions based on real needs.
Public-interest foundations can also play a part in health innovation. The Belgian Red Cross recently joined BioWin network and wants to be involved to contribute ideas or solutions to specific challenges.
“Joining BioWin is an important step for the Belgian Red Cross. By entering this health innovation community, we want to engage in collaborations across different industries to exchange ideas and explore innovative solutions that can lead to valuable breakthroughs in areas like mobile health, telemedicine and humanitarian logistics. Our goal is to put innovation at the service of the most vulnerable people, especially in times of crisis or isolation,” says Tome Najdovski, Production manager for labile blood products, Service Francophone du Sang at Croix-Rouge de Belgique.
By combining knowledge, removing barriers, and supporting new partnerships, BioWin is helping to make innovation happen, both in Wallonia and across Europe. This is how a stronger, more resilient healthcare system is being built: one project at a time.
About BioWin
BioWin is Wallonia’s health cluster. It brings together talent from business, science, medicine, and engineering to develop innovative solutions in health-tech and biopharma. Since it was founded, BioWin has supported 89 innovation projects worth a total of €313 million. In 2024 alone, its members raised €12.5 million in combined public and private funding.
BioWin supports collaborative innovation by helping to shape and fund promising projects, at the regional, national or European level. The team works closely with project leaders to turn ideas into useful, sustainable and concrete collaborations that benefit the entire ecosystem.