Biotech Act – why and for what purpose?
Publication date: February 6, 2026
Some hard numbers reveal the paradox: the EU has a highly developed research sector vs. the EU is a region with a challenging commercialization environment compared to other global leaders.
Biotechnology is one of the fastest-growing research and innovation sectors in the world today, and the European Union plays a significant role in this process. Over the past decade, the number of biotechnology researchers in the EU has nearly doubled, from approximately 42,000 in 2012 to over 81,000 in 2021, and the share of employment in this field has reached 17.2% of total R&D employment. These figures confirm that Europe has a strong scientific base and is systematically building capacity in technologies critical to health, industry, and food security.
The article was prepared by KG LEGAL KIEŁTYKA GŁADKOWSKI based in Cracow, Poland, specialising in cross border cases, with its focus on new technologies, IT and life science, discusses start-ups, differences between business secret and know-how and the value of these for a company being a start-up, protection of intellectual property, the importance of patent law for start-ups, protection of biotechnological inventions, copyright, the patentability of inventions, protection of IT solutions, procedures for obtaining a patent and rights granted under a patent.
