UCB PHARMA SA

Their core work

UCB Pharma is a major Belgian biopharmaceutical company focused on developing treatments for severe diseases in immunology and neurology. Within H2020, they contributed industrial expertise in protein engineering, biotherapeutics production, and mammalian/microbial expression systems. Their participation centers on training early-stage researchers (via Marie Skłodowska-Curie programmes) in bioprocessing and drug manufacturing technologies, bridging academic research with industrial pharmaceutical production.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

UCB Pharma's early H2020 involvement (2015-2016) centered on mammalian cell engineering (eCHO Systems) and protein secretion engineering (ProteinFactory), alongside isotopic labeling for drug design (ISOTOPICS). By 2019, their focus shifted toward microbial expression hosts and systems biology approaches for biotherapeutics production (Secreters), suggesting a broadening from purely mammalian platforms to include microbial production systems. This evolution reflects the pharmaceutical industry's growing interest in diversified biomanufacturing platforms.

UCB is expanding from traditional CHO-based mammalian production toward microbial expression platforms, positioning themselves at the intersection of systems biology and industrial biomanufacturing.

How they like to work

UCB Pharma exclusively participates as a partner or third party — never as coordinator — which is typical for large pharma companies contributing industrial context to academic-led training networks. With 56 unique partners across 13 countries, they engage broadly rather than deeply with any single partner. Their role is consistently that of an industry host providing real-world pharmaceutical R&D environments for early-stage researchers trained through MSCA networks.

UCB has collaborated with 56 unique partners across 13 countries, reflecting the broad, multi-institutional nature of MSCA training networks. Their network is pan-European with no visible geographic concentration beyond their Belgian base.

What sets them apart

UCB Pharma brings the perspective of a top-20 global biopharmaceutical company to academic training consortia, offering ESRs exposure to industrial-scale biotherapeutics development that universities cannot replicate. Their specific strength is in protein expression and secretion systems — both mammalian and microbial — giving them a dual-platform expertise rare among pharma participants in MSCA networks. For consortium builders, UCB offers credibility, industrial hosting capacity, and deep knowledge of what it takes to move biologics from lab bench to manufacturing.

Highlights from their portfolio

• Secreters
  Most recent and technically specific project — focused on next-generation microbial expression hosts for biotherapeutics, representing UCB's strategic shift toward microbial platforms.
• eCHO Systems
  The only project with recorded EC funding (EUR 250,560), focused on enhancing Chinese Hamster Ovary cell systems — the workhorse of industrial biopharmaceutical production.
• ISOTOPICS
  Stands apart from the biologics production theme, addressing isotopic labeling for drug innovation — showing UCB's breadth beyond manufacturing into drug design tools.