Lygature LIVE 2026: Two Decades of Collaboration, Looking Ahead to Tomorrow’s Health

This year’s edition focused on a forward-looking yet reflective theme: connecting 20 years of pioneering partnerships with the opportunities shaping the future of health innovation.

Held in an open and collaborative atmosphere, the event provided a platform for exchanging insights, sharing lessons learned, and exploring future directions for health innovation. As in previous years, the program combined concrete project examples with broader reflections on the evolving health innovation ecosystem.

Throughout the afternoon, speakers and participants alike emphasized that today’s health challenges cannot be solved in isolation. Across every presentation, a common message emerged: meaningful innovation depends on trusted partnerships that bring together diverse expertise, perspectives, and shared ambition.

Looking back: Two decades of partnerships and impact

The afternoon opened with a welcome and introduction by moderator Hans Schikan, whose extensive experience in the Life Sciences & Health sector set the tone for a program focused on both insight and action.

In the first session, speakers reflected on key milestones and lessons learned from two decades of collaborative innovation.

Hans van Eenennaam (IMMIOS, STANT, Sairopa) illustrated the critical role of public–private partnerships in clinical innovation through the journey of zigakibart (BION-1301). His presentation highlighted how early-stage collaboration between academia and industry can translate into tangible clinical progress, underlining the importance of shared vision, scientific excellence, and strategic decision-making.

Reflecting on the role of partnership in innovation, Hans noted: “Lygature has been pivotal in delivering innovation to patients, for patients. We need new clinical innovations: partnerships and Lygature are key for this.”

Gerrit Meijer (Health-RI, NKI) then provided a comprehensive perspective on the evolution of health data infrastructure, tracing developments from the TraIT project to the establishment of Health-RI. Gerrit emphasized that “to solve the scientific challenges of the future, we need to scale up and speed up. This requires investment in public-private partnerships.”
He described the implementation of the European Health Data Space as a once in a lifetime opportunity to solve the big challenges that we have in reusing high-quality health data for research and innovation, and Health-RI as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make this implementation a success.

Julia Lischke (Lygature) highlighted that collaboration is increasingly under pressure, particularly in the global health landscape, making trusted partnerships more important than ever. Through examples such as UNITE4TB, the Pediatric Praziquantel Consortium and END2AMR, she illustrated how Lygature brings together the right expertise, governance structures, and trusted relationships to ensure collaboration at scale.

The first half of the program concluded with Jorg Janssen (Lygature) unveiling Lygature’s 20-year timeline together with former and current colleagues. He started with thanking all people involved, and especially all our 250+ partner organization all over Europe and worldwide. The timeline marks key milestones and illustrates the organization’s role as a connector and enabler within the health innovation ecosystem. It offered participants an opportunity to reflect on Lygature’s evolution over the last two decades and the impact of the partnerships it has helped to build.

Download timeline PDF-file

Looking forward: Tomorrow’s health, together

Following a networking break, the second part of Lygature LIVE shifted focus to emerging opportunities and future directions.

Janneke Samsom (Erasmus MC) introduced ImmuneHealthXL, a collaborative initiative aimed at transforming research and treatment of immune-mediated inflammatory diseases. By bringing together diverse stakeholders and adopting a disease-overarching approach, the initiative seeks to accelerate innovation and improve outcomes for patients. Janneke described “tenacity” as a defining characteristic of Lygature’s contribution to ImmuneHealthXL, explaining how stakeholder engagement and partnership building helped create a shared vision across academia and industry. Ultimately, she emphasized that success will be measured by better outcomes for patients through more coordinated research and innovation.

Trudy Straetemans (UMCU) presented DARE NL, a national infrastructure for advanced therapy medicinal products (ATMPs). Her session highlighted both the progress made and the ongoing challenges in aligning stakeholders, standardizing processes, and ensuring timely patient access to advanced therapies. As Trudy concluded, “Systemic hurdles can only be solved with all stakeholders together, and with Lygature on our side, we can do this.” Her presentation demonstrated how DARE NL is building a sustainable national infrastructure to accelerate patient access to advanced therapies through collaboration, harmonization and shared expertise.

Sophie Huiskes-Berends (Lygature) addressed the implementation of AI in mental healthcare, focusing on the gap between technological potential and real-world application. Her insights underscored the importance of collaboration, AI-readiness, and practical integration for achieving sustainable impact. Sophie highlighted that “The biggest barrier to AI in healthcare is not technology, it’s implementation.” She emphasized that building an AI-ready healthcare ecosystem requires collaboration across organizations, noting that no single stakeholder can achieve this alone.

From shared challenges to actionable opportunities

A recurring theme throughout the event was the importance of addressing real-world challenges together. Rather than focusing on barriers, speakers highlighted practical approaches for creating the conditions needed to accelerate innovation and improve patient outcomes.

The diverse composition of the audience contributed to lively discussions and the exchange of perspectives across disciplines and sectors. The networking sessions created opportunities to connect with peers facing similar challenges and explore new partnerships.

Strengthening the ecosystem

Lygature LIVE once again highlighted the importance of strong, interconnected ecosystems in driving health innovation. From data infrastructure and global health initiatives to ATMP development and AI implementation, the sessions demonstrated that collaboration remains a critical success factor.

Looking ahead

As the event concluded with drinks and informal networking, discussions continued on how to translate insights into concrete next steps. Lygature LIVE 2026 reaffirmed that there is no one-size-fits-all approach to collaboration, but that shared experiences and collective ambition can serve as a powerful foundation for progress.

With its focus on both reflection and forward momentum, this year’s edition reinforced the importance of staying connected, adaptive, and committed to improving health outcomes through collaboration. Moderator Hans Schikan concluded the day’s events by observing that “tenacity” had been the word of the day - a fitting reflection on the perseverance, trust and long-term commitment required to build partnerships that ultimately improve health outcomes. As Lygature looks ahead to its next chapter, those qualities will remain as relevant as ever.

Presentation slides

A selection of presentation slides from Lygature LIVE are available below: