IBETH BIERMANN

Ibeth Lotte Biermann, born Duchêne, was born in Völklingen (Saarland), on November 22, 1928. She spent her childhood in Püttlingen and Saarbrücken, before her family moved from Saarland to Friedrichshafen, Bodensee. After layovers in Hüttigsheim (Ulm), Burgberg and Stuttgart, she moved to Frankfurt am Main, where she has been working for the Holzbrink publishing company. During which time she met Dr. Hans Georg Biermann and in 1960 they got married. Already five years before, they both founded the GESIPA GmbH, a company producing blind rivets and corresponding tools. Shortly after, the company expanded to a globally worldwide acting enterprise. After her husband died from cancer, she successfully governed the company together with her adoptive son Roland Biermann, until 2008, when the enterprise was sold. At the same time, Ibeth was founding the Dr. Hans Georg Biermann foundation to support projects in the field of cancer research.

In 2018 Ibeth Biermann founded IB Cancer Research. The main purpose of this foundation is to become an institute for basic cancer research. She is committed to a better understanding of the origin of cancer and it is a concern of her heart to help finding novel cancer treatment options to reduce cancer-related mortality.

Apart from her dedication for science, art has ever since spread joy among her, which was the main motivator for Ibeth Biermann to generously support well-known museums and artists.

Why founding IB Cancer Research?

(Ibeth Biermann about her intention)

It was in the beginning of the 1980´s that my husband contracted cancer and he died within a couple of months after diagnosis. This was my first and decisive experience with this disease. Reflecting back on that time, I have ever since engaged with cancer disease and I gained two important considerations for myself. First of all, the number of newly diagnosed cases is still increasing and second, the tremendous amount of money spend into cancer research, does not result in the desired success. For that reason, I decided to raise a foundation, which is creating a favourable environment for researchers to conduct their studies and experiments. Therefore, the foundation is governed by a scientist and I am happy, I could win Dr. Rainer Hanselmann to become chairman of the board.

Cancer is a complex disease and a fast and easy solution cannot be expected. However, I would like to make the wish to all scientists of IBCR to be fortunate in their attempts to contribute to the fight of this frightful disease and I would highly appreciate to have laid the foundations to reach this ambitious goal.

Ibeth Biermann

Organization and foundation bodies

IB Cancer Research is a non-profit foundation, located in Saarbrücken, Germany. IBCR is a non-governmental, free and independent research institution, committed to increasing the understanding of cancer development, thus contributing to improve therapeutic options for patients. In order to achieve this aim, we employ state-of-the-art molecular biology, cell biology and microscopy techniques. Access to in house not-available cost-intensive methods (e.g. next-generation sequencing (NGS) or mass spectrometry) are guaranteed through establishing collaborations with excellent university and industry partners.

Chairman of the management board is Dr. med. Rainer G. Hanselmann.

Members of the board of trustees:

Herrn David Lembert (Chairman of the board of trustees)
Herrn Martin Monzel (stellv. Vorsitzender des Kuratoriums)
Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Marc Schneider
Dr. rer. nat. Mathias Engel

The foundation has been initially established 2018. In January 2019, laboratories on Saarland University campus were rented in „Starterzentrum“. Already one and a half year later, the foundation moved into laboratories and offices to Science Park 2, located next to Saarland University, Saarbrücken..