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Paul Johnston

Ambassador to Ireland

Part of Global Science and Innovation Network UK in Sweden

25th September 2013

UK Life Science Goes On Tour

For the fifth consecutive year the UKTI team in Sweden organised a R&D Drug Development tour which brought together 16 UK research companies with players from the Swedish life science sector. This year, the tour moved away from Stockholm and emphasised other life science clusters such as the newly formed Medicon Village in Lund and Sahlgrenska Science Park in Gothenburg. Over the 2 day event the companies had 107 meetings.

The tour started off in Lund, where the 23 British delegates listened to presentations by Cristina Glad (Bioinvent AB), Åsa Sjöholm Timén (Spago Imaging AB) and Adam Bruce, founder of Tikomed, about the types of collaboration that they are looking for and explained their pipeline development. To facilitate clinical research in the UK Ravi Chana from the Office for Clinical Research Infrastructure (NOCRI) gave a presentation on what help they can offer both Swedish and UK companies.

The tour then continued to Gothenburg where Lars Wiklund, the British Honorary Consul, hosted a dinner, with lively discussions, covering the future of Contract Research Organisations, the role of governments and the public sector in promoting collaboration, as well as patent expiry in the sector.

On the final day, the UK delegation met with companies from the Sahlgrenska Science Park network. Mattias Rehnberg (AstraZeneca R&D) highlighted the outsourcing needs that are experienced by large pharma companies. At the same time, the Park Annual Life Science Conference took place, which gave the UK delegates the opportunity to meet with 350 life science companies from all over Sweden.

The follow up has just started but we can already reveal that UK companies have already secured direct business worth up to £900,000, with bright prospects for the future. Through this activity UKTI Sweden was not only able to generate inward investment leads and trade wins, but also to make a contribution to delivering on the UK government’s Life Science strategy.

UKTI R&D Drug Development Tour

About Paul Johnston

Paul Johnston joined the UK Civil Service in 1990, working for the Ministry of Defence initially. He has served in Paris and New York and has also had a wide…

Paul Johnston joined the UK Civil Service in 1990, working for the Ministry of Defence initially.

He has served in Paris and New York and has also had a wide range of political and security roles in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London. Paul joined the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in 1993 as Desk Officer for Bosnia. As part of this role he was also Private Secretary to EU negotiator Lord Owen and his representative on Bosnia Contact Group.

His first foreign posting was to Paris in 1995-99 as Second Secretary Political. He was Private Secretary to the Ambassador and latterly part of the UK delegation to the Kosovo Rambouillet negotiations. Then he returned to London as Head of the Kosovo Policy Team, leading work on post-conflict policy in the EU, NATO, UN and G8.

Before his second overseas posting to New York in 2005, Paul held a variety of other EU policy and security appointments in London, such as Head of European Defence Section between 2000-01 and Head of Security Policy Department between 2002-04.

As Head of the Political Section in UKMIS New York, he advised on major policy issues for the UK on the Security Council and the UN World Summit, including the UK EU Presidency in 2005.

Paul returned to London in 2008 as Director, International Security for the FCO. He was responsible for policy on UN, NATO, European Security, arms control and disarmament, human rights and good governance.

Paul was British Ambassador to Sweden from August 2011 to August 2015 and then was Deputy Permanent Representative to NATO.

He was UK Ambassador to the EU for Political and Security affairs from 2017 to January 2020 and became Ambassador to Ireland in September 2020.

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