"EMA will turn Amsterdam into a pharma hotspot"
In today's Financieele Dagblad Ruud Smits, co-head of NautaDutilh's Life Sciences and Technology teams, commented on the European Medicines Agency's (EMA) upcoming move to Amsterdam in 2019. "This fits in the picture to create a biotech-pharma hub in the Netherlands near Leiden, Amsterdam, Utrecht and Wageningen."
EMA is crucial to guaranteeing patient safety in Europe: the agency supervises medicines for both human and animal use and helps national authorities authorise the sale of drugs across the EU's single market of some 500 million people. It has been based in London since 1995 and employs about 900 people. After its relocation in 2019, EMA's headquarters will be a tailor-made building in Amsterdam’s Zuidas business district. After lots were drawn on Monday when three rounds of voting failed to produce a winner, Amsterdam beat Milan to become the new hometown of the European Medicines Agency.
Read the article here (available in Dutch).