By Olesia Karvetskaia, COO
November 12, 2026
Some of the hardest problems in medicine are not short of science. They are short of a business case.
Antimicrobial resistance, neurodegenerative disease and women’s health all have real scientific promise, and patients are waiting for it. Yet each of them keeps meeting the same kinds of market failure. New antibiotics are rightly kept back as a last resort, so they earn too little to pay back the cost of developing them. Brain disorders mean long, risky development paths that make investors cautious. Women’s health has been studied too little for generations, often on the assumption that what works in men also works in women. In each field there is breakthrough research, and in each the money and partnerships needed to reach patients have been too slow to follow.
Venture Bridge was created to change that, one connection at a time.
From journeys to a bridge
The idea behind Venture Bridge is simple. Every journey links the Nordic life science hub with another of the world’s leading hubs, and every journey shines a light on unmet medical needs that deserve more investment than they get. The journeys started in California in 2025, continued in Germany the same year and reached the United Kingdom in 2026. Each one has brought together founders, investors, researchers and institutions who would rarely end up in the same room otherwise.
This December, the bridge comes back to where it starts. From 7 to 10 December 2026, Venture Bridge Nordics will gather investors from every ecosystem the earlier journeys reached in Stockholm, together with leading companies and institutions from those hubs. For four days, Sweden’s leading life science settings will be where Nordic innovation meets a growing international network.
The theme states the ambition plainly: Unlocking the Business Case of Unmet Medical Needs. The aim is not to describe these problems once more. It is to work out, with the people who hold the capital, the science and the commercial know-how, how solutions can actually be funded, built and brought to patients.
Rooted in the Sweden–UK partnership
Venture Bridge Nordics builds on the Sweden–UK Memorandum of Understanding on life science collaboration. It turns a shared government ambition into real meetings, conversations and action. We are proud that the British Embassy Stockholm supports the initiative, which Ventures Accelerated introduces.
Three tracks, three unmet needs
The programme is built around three tracks. Each brings together the voices that know its problem best.
Antimicrobial Resistance: The Silent Pandemic. Few people have done more to raise awareness of AMR than the two keynote speakers. Alison Holmes, Director of the Fleming Initiative, opens the session. Otto Cars, founder of ReAct and Professor Emeritus in Infectious Diseases at Uppsala University, follows with a keynote on the urgent global need for new antibiotics. The pitch session is moderated by Matthew Tulley of Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust. The investor roundtable brings together the British Embassy, Paddington Life Sciences, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust and ReAct/Uppsala University.
Healthy Minds: Neurodegenerative and Brain Disorders. Mathias Uhlén, Professor at KTH and Director of the Human Protein Atlas programme, gives the keynote on the Human Brain Atlas. A panel follows with Precision NeuroMed, IRLAB, Collective Minds and 3Z Pharmaceuticals. Louise Jopling of Babraham Research Campus leads the investor roundtable with AbbVie and the SV Health Dementia Discovery Fund.
Women’s Health: Different in Women. Anna af Ugglas, Chief Executive of the International Confederation of Midwives, gives the keynote. Christina Lloyd, Chairwoman of VILDA, then moderates a panel with Curie Capital, Babraham Institute, Gilde Healthcare, DNB Fund and the Nordic Charter for Women’s Health 2040. The investor roundtable includes BioReperia/LifeScience Invest, Feminvest Ventures, Futurewave and OnDosis.
Celebrating the Champions of Unmet Medical Needs
On the evening of Wednesday 9 December, the three tracks come together under one roof. The Impact Gala “Celebrating the Champions of Unmet Medical Needs” takes place in the former factory and invention workshop of Alfred Nobel. More than a century ago, an inventor’s work there turned into a legacy that still honours progress for the benefit of humanity. In winter, the old brick halls by the water are lit by candlelight. Here, 150 international guests will gather in black tie: scientists, founders, investors, clinicians and policymakers who have spent the week tackling some of medicine’s hardest problems. Over a three-course dinner by chef Markus Aujalay, with wines from the Kullaberg vineyard, the focus turns from debate to celebration. The evening honours those brave enough to walk the steepest paths in global health, the champions who keep moving innovation forward where the market has not.
At the heart of the evening are three awards, one for each track, chosen by three juries of exceptional standing. Leading scientists sit beside investors, clinicians, policymakers and patient advocates. The jurors include Carl-Henrik Heldin, Chairman Emeritus of the Board of the Nobel Foundation, AMR pioneers Otto Cars and Alison Holmes, Ole Petter Ottersen, President Emeritus of Karolinska Institutet, and Anna af Ugglas of the International Confederation of Midwives. With them are representatives of the European Investment Bank, the British Embassy, the Nordic Charter for Women’s Health 2040 and some of Europe’s most committed life science investors. Few rooms bring together this much expertise around a single question: what does real progress against an unmet medical need look like?
The awards answer that question. In each track, the award honours a company that has made a verifiable advance towards a commercially sustainable solution to one of medicine’s most persistent gaps, whether in antimicrobial resistance, brain health or women’s health. These are the fields where good science has too often stalled for lack of a business case, so the awards celebrate the companies that are proving one can be built. They are deliberately open to companies still on the way, not only those already on the market, because that stretch of the journey is where the most important breakthroughs are won or lost and where recognition counts most. The awards are not investment due diligence. They are a public statement that this work matters, and a spotlight on the champions who show that unmet medical needs can be met.
The bridge is built
Looking at the programme as a whole, we feel quietly proud. A year and a half ago, Venture Bridge was an idea about connecting ecosystems around the problems the market keeps overlooking. Today it brings together a government partnership, an embassy, Nobel Foundation leadership, leading investors from several continents and the people who have shaped the global response to AMR, brain health and women’s health.
It shows that a focused, curated initiative can bring these people together around a shared purpose. It also shows that unmet medical needs, given the right setting, can attract the attention they have long deserved.
The next step is to make sure the conversations in Stockholm turn into what comes after them: partnerships, investments, and treatments that reach the patients who need them most.