The Fellowship of the Labs: An Experiment in Strengthening Indo-Swiss Collaborations

Antibiotics have been a miracle drug since they were first discovered in 1928. Over the last 50 years, we've used and abused them to the point that bacteria have become very good at developing antimicrobial resistances (AMR) and AMR is now a looming global health threat, with nearly 5 million lives lost per year due to AMR-related complications. Like climate change, AMR requires collective action. To play our small part, in 2023 we launched the Indo-Swiss Innovation Platform—a strategic and systemic approach to grow Indo-Swiss partnerships in health, sustainability and digital transformation.

The Platform was launched with a three-day Indo-Swiss AMR Innovation Dialogue featuring over 50 Swiss and Indian delegates. Apart from focussing on bacteria and treating bacterial infections via antibiotics, conversations also touched upon novel therapies such as phages (the use of viruses to infect and kill bacteria); the lack of focus on fungal, viral and other microbial infections; reasons for investors offering sufficient funding to startups in the antibiotic space but pulling out when the product is at a later stage of being developed; as well as the drain of experienced scientists engaged in developing new therapeutics leading to companies shutting down thus setting back high-quality research and development. A selection of presentations from the AMR Dialogue can be accessed here.

The Dialogue was only the beginning of our efforts around AMR. Since then, participants have submitted a grant proposal to the Leading House, started working on proposals for the upcoming One Health open call of the Indo-Swiss Joint Research Programme, are interviewing Indian candidates to join their lab through a ThinkSwiss scholarship, and we hosted an AMR Industry Roundtable on the margins of the World Economic Forum.

Our work on AMR serves as a case study and framework for the Innovation Platform and it will guide our future activities and engagements in health, sustainability and digital transformation. The Platform marks a new stage for Swissnex in India as we strive to align our programming with external funding instruments more closely to move beyond cursory conversations and create more ambitious and lasting collaborations in areas we commit ourselves to.