Stockholm's BioLamina obtains a €20 million loan from the EIB.

      The European Investment Bank is providing a €20 million loan to BioLamina, a Swedish biotechnology firm that supplies laminin-based cell culture matrices utilized by stem cell therapy developers globally. This funding will aid in the expansion of laminin technology production and the development of animal-free drug safety testing methods.

      BioLamina, based in Stockholm, focuses on producing protein scaffolding necessary for growing stem cells intended for therapeutic use. The company has secured a €20 million loan from the European Investment Bank. According to the EIB's Stockholm office, this financial support will facilitate the further development of laminin technologies that enable advanced cell therapies and more sophisticated animal-free drug safety testing methods.

      BioLamina plays a vital role in the cell therapy ecosystem by providing extracellular matrix proteins that help researchers and companies cultivate, expand, and differentiate stem cells reliably outside the human body, rather than developing therapies directly. Its main product line, Biolaminin®, consists of full-length human recombinant laminin proteins, which mimic the proteins found in natural tissue environments.

      Laminins are essential structural components of the basement membrane, which lies beneath epithelial and endothelial cells, and they induce specific responses in cells, including adhesion, survival, differentiation, and organization. Most commercial alternatives use truncated or non-human versions of these proteins; BioLamina asserts that using full-length human laminins leads to more biologically relevant conditions, resulting in cell products that are more consistent, reproducible, and clinically compliant.

      The potential therapeutic uses for cells cultivated on laminin matrices are extensive. These cell therapies may be effective in treating conditions such as type 1 diabetes (by generating insulin-producing beta cells), Parkinson’s disease, heart failure, acute liver failure, and cancer, among others that are currently challenging to treat or for which there is no cure.

      BioLamina has partnered with Novo Nordisk on stem cell treatments for diabetes, and it collaborates with Cell X Technologies on iPSC-based therapeutic manufacturing workflows. Established in 2008 based on research conducted by Dr. Karl Tryggvason at the Karolinska Institutet and Duke-NUS Medical School, BioLamina is headquartered in Sundbyberg, part of Greater Stockholm, and employs around 100 to 117 individuals, according to various estimates.

      Its main shareholders include the Swedish investment firm Bure Equity AB (through Bure Growth), Lauxera Capital Partners, the Tryggvason family, and Northislet. The company secured €19 million in equity financing in July 2024, led by Lauxera Capital Partners.

      The €20 million loan from the EIB marks the company’s first publicly disclosed debt financing and aligns with the EIB's broader BioTechEU initiative, announced in December 2025, which aims to mobilize €10 billion in biotech investments during 2026-27. CEO Klaus Langhoff-Roos has articulated BioLamina’s mission as demonstrating that “full-length equals full-function,” a principle that extends to its drug safety testing products, which offer animal-free alternatives to the traditionally used animal-derived extracellular matrices in toxicology screening. This EIB loan will support both facets of the business.