Europe is not short of scientific founders or early capital. It is short of the specific combination that produced BioNTech: patient anchor capital plus state co-financing plus a global commercial partner, sustained over a decade, without forcing the founder team to relocate to the US. That combination still exists in DACH only by accident. Until it exists by design, BioNTech remains a one-off rather than a model. Introduction Executive summary Europe has world-class scientif