Antoine Papiernik speaks at Growing Together Athens event

Sofinnova Partners' Chairman and Managing Partner, Antoine Papiernik, spoke on April 4th at the opening plenary session of Growing Together Athens, an event that gathered 300 entrepreneurs, investors, bankers and representatives from European institutions.

The inaugural event, organized by the Hellenic Development Bank (HDB) and Bpifrance, the Greek and French national investment banks, provided networking opportunities and a forum to discuss how investors and development banks can come together to drive innovation, growth and economic attractiveness in Europe. In addition, eight Greek entrepreneurs seeking to raise more than €35 million presented their pitches to investors and other stakeholders.

Papiernik's message was one of hope and ambition. In this context, he spoke of Sofinnova Partners' long history — the firm got its start in 1972, with 5 million francs (less than $1 million) under management, and today has more than €2.5 billion under management, and a team of 60 people representing 18 nationalities.

"We believe that Europe has everything it needs in order to be a major player in our field of life sciences," Papiernik said, listing technology, talent and capital as the three key ingredients. In France, he pointed out, mindsets and regulations have changed for the better. Until 1999, Papiernik pointed out, it was not legal for a scientist at a French university to have an ownership stake in a start-up.

Looking to the future, Papiernik said Europe needed to look beyond "unicorns." "Europe needs, within the next 10, 20 years, companies that are worth a hundred billion dollars," he said, adding that, "we need to have what it takes, which is hope and ambition."

Watch the video of Antoine Papiernik's speech