The Maturing of Europe's Biotechs

**Vincent Mutel** made a risky move when he left a cushy job with Basel pharmaceutical giant **Roche** to co-found a startup in Europe, long seen as a **biotech** backwater. But his bet paid off big-time on May 22 when his company, Addex Pharmaceutical, raised $128 million on the Swiss Exchange—valuing it at $348 million—the biggest biotech initial public offering in either Europe or the U.S. in the past three years. For Addex, whose potential drugs include compounds targeting migraines and gastroesophageal reflux disease, the successful IPO means "we can move forward and grow the company to be even more successful in the future," says Mutel, who was previously head of the pharmacology group in Roche's central-nervous-system diseases department. For investors, it's proof that **European biotech** is no longer about science for its own sake, but instead increasingly focused on delivering products for unmet medical needs with big potential for return. "We have reason to rejoice," says Antoine Papiernik, a general partner at Paris venture capital firm Sofinnova Partners, one of the founding investors in **Addex**. Whole article on "businessweek":[ http://www.businessweek.com/print/globalbiz/content/may2007/gb20070522_399291.htm]

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