BRIGHTskills- EU Health Industry Skills Strategy

BRIGHTskills launches EU Health Industry Skills Strategy to address shortage of hybrid professionals

• A new Strategy sets out six concrete steps to address urgent skills gaps across Europe’s pharmaceutical and biomanufacturing, MedTech, digital health and medical supplies sectors
• Research shows the European Health industry needs ‘hybrid’ professionals with expertise across disciplines, but 72% of survey respondents cited lack of time as their primary barrier to training
• Industry stakeholders are invited to give feedback and help shape the Strategy ahead of its final publication in 2028

 

BRIGHTskills, a four-year EU-funded project led by EIT Health and implemented by a consortium of 24 partners, launches the first edition of the EU Health Industry Skills Strategy.

Developed by the BRIGHTskills consortium under the leadership of DIGITALEUROPE, the Strategy provides a roadmap to help employers, education providers and policymakers anticipate emerging skills needs and equip Europe’s health industry workforce for future challenges.

Across the survey, interviews and focus groups, one of the most consistent findings was a shortage of “hybrid” professionals: people who can combine technical expertise with clinical knowledge, regulatory understanding and digital skills. These profiles are highly valued and difficult to find across the health industry. BRIGHTskills aims to help address this gap through its strategy and training courses, to support the development of the multidisciplinary skills the sector needs.

The launch follows research conducted by the project involving 246 respondents, which found that 72% cited lack of time as their primary barrier to training. This highlights the need for shorter, modular and flexible learning opportunities that health industry professionals can combine with their day-to-day responsibilities.

The Strategy has identified six key areas to ensure EU innovators can keep up with global competition:

• Develop a reliable system to understand current and future workforce skills needs across Europe’s health industry ecosystem.
• Ensure training and skills development match these identified industry needs and changing workforce demands.
• Create flexible learning pathways that can adapt to future healthcare challenges.
• Improve digital, AI, data, regulatory, sustainability and other transferable skills across the workforce.
• Foster collaboration between industry, educators and other stakeholders to support implementation and uptake.
• Ensure training programmes are high quality, recognised, sustainable and adopted long-term.

Helena Lovegrove, Senior Director of Projects & Operations, DIGITALEUROPE, said:

“For a skills strategy to deliver meaningful results, it must be grounded in the realities of the industry and the challenges employers face. This means understanding not only which skills are needed, but also how businesses can effectively develop and access them.

“At DIGITALEUROPE, we are pleased to lead the development of the EU Health Industry Skills Strategy and bring the industry’s perspective into this process. We look forward to working with our BRIGHTskills partners and wider stakeholders to ensure that the Strategy’s priorities translate into practical, actionable recommendations that respond to the needs of Europe’s health industry.”

Céline Carrera, Director of Programmes & Delivery, EIT Health, said:

“Europe’s ability to set the pace in health innovation depends on people having the right skills to navigate digitalisation, AI and evolving regulatory requirements. We need to build a workforce that can continuously adapt, collaborate and innovate.

“The BRIGHTskills EU Health Industry Skills Strategy is an important step in this direction. At EIT Health, our unique ability to bring together business, education and research can help Europe’s health industry build a workforce that is ahead of the curve, rather than running to catch up.”

The published Strategy is an initial framework and the start of a wider validation process. BRIGHTskills is inviting industry, education and training providers, research organisations, public authorities, sector associations, SMEs and other stakeholders to assess whether the proposed priorities are relevant, complete, feasible and appropriately sequenced.

Feedback gathered through open questionnaires and Industry Dialogue Workshops will be used to further refine the Strategy. The findings, alongside input from the European Health Industry Skills Partnership, established under the EU Pact for Skills, and evidence from training and validation activities, will inform the next iteration of the Strategy in August 2027 and the final Strategy in June 2028.

Join the online launch and consultation

The Strategy will be presented at an online launch event on 19 November 2026 at 11:00 CET. Stakeholders are invited to:

• Register for the online launch event here and have your say in shaping future health industry skills.
• Follow BRIGHTskills for consultation dates and project updates: https://bright-skills.eu.

 

About BRIGHTskills

BRIGHTskills is an EU-funded project bringing together 24 partners to support skills development across the European health industry ecosystem. The project is co-funded by the Erasmus+ programme of the European Union under Grant Agreement No. 101187080. More information is available at https://bright-skills.eu.

About EIT Health

EIT Health is a community of health innovators which connects world-class member organisations with thousands of start-ups and entrepreneurs. Supported by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), a body of the European Union, EIT Health collaborates across borders to deliver new solutions that can enable European citizens to live longer, healthier lives.

Over the past decade, EIT Health has supported the launch of 135 health innovations, trained 70,000 healthcare professionals and entrepreneurs, and helped attract €2.4 billion in investment.

About the survey

The Strategy draws on the BRIGHTskills Skills Intelligence Study, which included 246 survey responses, 79 interviews and 119 focus-group participants across approximately 25 European countries. A separate questionnaire on workforce-development initiatives received 32 responses and identified more than 140 practices, tools and approaches, including modular learning, industry collaboration, AI and digital skills development, and practice-based training.

The findings will be considered alongside input from the Health Industry Large-Scale Skills Partnership, a pan-European network under the EU Pact for Skills. Led by EIT Health, it brings together more than 40 members.

Disclaimers

This Strategy aligns strongly with the ambition of the European Health Industry Skills Partnership (Pact for Skills) to build a resilient and future-ready workforce. At EIT Health, we believe that innovation can reach its full potential when people have the knowledge and skills to drive it. Investing in people is essential to turning Europe’s health innovation potential into real-world impact and building a resilient, future-ready health workforce.

This initial Strategy is published for consultation and validation and has not yet been officially approved by the European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA) within the framework of the project.

This publication has been prepared within the framework of the BRIGHTskills project, co-funded by the Erasmus+ programme of the European Union under Grant Agreement No. 101187080. The European Commission’s support for the production of this publication does not constitute an endorsement of its contents, which reflect the views of the authors alone. The Commission cannot be held responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained in it.

Contact

For further information or enquiries, please contact: Iryna Gosa, iryna.gosa@eithealth.eu