The Brain House
Davos 2026
Taking place at the World Economic Forum's Annual Meeting
Davos-Klosters, Switzerland | January 19th-22nd, 2026
Advancing a Global Movement for Brain-Powered Solutions
In 2026, The Brain House - a groundbreaking initiative to harness brain power to solve today’s most pressing challenges - returns to Davos, from January 19-22, with an expanded vision and a renewed sense of urgency yet grounded in a simple but powerful idea: strengthening the brain strengthens societies and economies.
By elevating brain health, cognitive performance, and human resilience, we can accelerate economic growth, improve social stability, and build more adaptive systems for the future.
Throughout the week, and across the promenade, The Brain House will host conversations, share global insights, and serve as a collaborative hub where policymakers, scientists, entrepreneurs, and advocates work together to shape a more prosperous and resilient future.
Registration is now closed. If you would like to request last-minute registration should a spot become available, please email DAC at inquiry@davosalzheimerscollaborative.org
Please note that all attendees must have a hotel badge to access sessions at the Seehof Hotel.
Panels
Brain Capital, Natural Capital & Collective Stewardship: Advancing the Brain Economy for a Well-Being Future
Hosted by TPC House in collaboration with The Brain House
Monday, Jan 19 | 1:30 - 3:30 pm CET
Location: TPC House - Awakening House (Promenade 45, 7270 Davos, Switzerland)
The world is undergoing profound transition—driven by technological acceleration, ecological stress, and weakening social cohesion. In this context, the Brain Economy is not a sector, but a unifying framework for resilience and human flourishing. The premise is simple: every major transition is ultimately a brain transition. Societies thrive when people can learn, adapt, cooperate, and innovate—and fragment when cognitive health, emotional resilience, and meaning erode. Brain health is therefore foundational infrastructure, as critical to long-term prosperity as energy, education, or capital. In an AI-shaped century, brain skills—lifelong learning, ethical judgment, emotional intelligence, and the ability to navigate complexity—become essential. Meaning and belonging function as stabilizing forces that sustain trust and collective performance. The Brain Economy also reveals deep interdependence: environmental conditions, social trust, and cognitive capacity rise and fall together. This session explores how advances in neuroscience, digital health, and data can make brain health more visible and actionable, aligning policy, investment, and innovation around the conditions that enable resilience, capability, and shared prosperity.
Speakers:
George Vradenburg, Chairman, Davos Alzheimer’s Collaborative
Dr. Bechara Saab, CEO and Chief Scientist at Mobio
Harris A. Eyre, MBBS, Ph.D, Senior Fellow, Rice University & The University of Texas Medical Branch; Senior Advisor, McKinsey Health Institute; Executive Director, Global Brain Economy Initiative
Rym Ayadi, PhD, Founder and President, Euro-Mediterranean Economists Association
David Gow, Chief Executive Officer, Center for Houston’s Future
Monday, January 19th, 2026
Brain Matters: Equity in the Age of Cognitive Health
Hosted by Goals House in collaboration with The Brain House
Monday, Jan 19 | 4:00 - 5:30 pm CET
Location: Goals House
Around the world, health systems are confronted with an aging population, limited resources, and persistent gaps in early detection and coordinated care. Strengthening diagnostics, expanding workforce training, and deploying digital tools can improve quality, equity, and long-term sustainability, particularly in under-resourced settings.
Join the Davos Alzheimer’s Collaborative for a cross-sector panel and reception that will help identify practical pathways for governments, businesses, and innovators to collaborate in building high-value health systems for all.
Speakers:
George Vradenburg, Chairman, Davos Alzheimer’s Collaborative
Susan Armiger, CEO, Catalight
Peter Lee, PhD, President, Microsoft Research
Michael Cook, PhD, Chief Science Officer, Our Future Health
Geneva AI Hub: Leading the Brain Economy in the Intelligent Age
Hosted by AI House in collaboration with Wyss Geneva and The Brain House
Monday, Jan 19 | 6:00 - 7:30 pm CET
Location: AI House Davos (Lounge, Middle Floor)
Begin the Davos social week with leaders working at the intersection of artificial intelligence and brain health. This session introduces a city-level, AI-driven brain economy initiative aligned with the five levers of the 2026 World Economic Forum Brain Economy Impact Report, highlighting how human and artificial intelligence can jointly deliver real-world outcomes.
Speakers:
Erwin Böttinger, Chief Executive Officer, Wyss Geneva; Professor of Artificial Intelligence in Human Health, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai
Wolf-Julian Neumann, Advisor, Wyss Geneva; Professor of Invasive Neurotechnology, Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin
Harris A. Eyre, MBBS, Ph.D, Senior Fellow, Rice University & The University of Texas Medical Branch; Senior Advisor, McKinsey Health Institute; Executive Director, Global Brain Economy Initiative
Tuesday, January 20, 2026
Transforming Brain Health: Translational Innovation for a New Global Era
Hosted by The Brain House
Tuesday, Jan 20 | 10:30 - 11:30 am CET
Location: Brain House at Vital-Lab in the ICON, Symondstrasse 7, Davos-Platz, Switzerland
Breakthroughs in biomarkers, early detection, and preventive interventions are expanding what’s possible across brain health—but translating discovery into equitable, population-level impact remains uneven. This session explores how leaders across science, biopharma, investment, and global health can align around shared priorities: advancing biomarker-enabled prevention, addressing co-pathologies and upstream drivers of both neurodegenerative and mental health conditions, and mobilizing capital and policy to deliver brain health as a global public good.
Speakers:
Dr. Sam Barrell CBE, CEO, LifeArc Philip Scheltens, MD, PhD, Partner and Head of the Dementia Fund in the EQT Life Sciences
Dan Skrovonsky, MD, PhD, Chief Scientific and Product Officer, Eli Lilly
John-Arne Røttingen, MD, PhD, Chief Executive Officer, Wellcome Trust
Moderator:
Shankar Vedantam, Host, Hidden Brain
Wednesday, January 21, 2026
Making the Connections: A Dialogue on Mental Health and Economic Prosperity
Hosted by the Brain House
Wednesday, Jan 21 | 10:10 - 10:45 a.m. CET
Location: ICON Building, Symondstrasse 7, 7270 Davos, Switzerland
Despite increasingly clear interdependence, healthcare, business, education, and policy too often operate in silos. This is especially true when we think about the role of mental health, the largest untapped driver of economic productivity and human capital. Investments in workforce mental health promise to unleash human potential, yet depression, anxiety, and substance use disorders alone still cost the global economy over $1 trillion annually in lost productivity.
This panel seeks to apply the spirit of dialogue to siloed sectors and break down the barriers to economic, health and social prosperity.
Speakers:
Patrick J. Kennedy, Founder, The Kennedy Forum
David Ko, CEO, Calm
Rebecca Bagley, CEO, The Kennedy Forum
Designing Communities That Protect the Brain: Longevity, Prevention, and the Economics of Healthy Aging
Hosted by the Brain House
Wednesday, Jan 21 | 10:45 - 11:30 am CET
Location: Brain House at Vital-Lab in the ICON, Symondstrasse 7, Davos-Platz, Switzerland
Drawing on decades of research from the Blue Zones—regions where people live longer with lower rates of neurodegenerative conditions and chronic diseases—this intimate roundtable will explore how community design, lifestyle norms, and social connection function as scalable, low-cost brain health interventions. By examining how prevention-oriented environments reduce cognitive decline, extend healthspan, and lower the cost burden of aging populations, the discussion will highlight the need for an all-of-the-above approach that improves affordability and access to quality care through both preventative and therapeutic measures. Featuring policy and healthcare leaders, the session will generate actionable steps to drive upstream investments in prevention, brain health innovation, and measurable economic returns.
Speakers:
Danny Buettner, JD, Executive Vice President and Chief Development Officer, Blue Zones
Jochen Reiser, MD, PhD, President, University of Texas Medical Branch
Shelley Lyford, CEO and Chair of the West Health Institute
Join CBS News for an Exclusive Session: What Brain Health Means to Me
Hosted by the Brain House and Catalight Foundation
Wednesday, Jan 21 | 3:30 - 4:30pm CET
Location: Seehof Davos Hotel – Ferdmann Room
Join CBS News at Davos for a recorded interview experience capturing personal perspectives on brain health—why it matters, how it shapes our lives, and what it means for the future of society.
Hosted by the Brain House and Catalight Foundation, this session will feature CBS News journalists recording short, on-camera conversations with leaders, innovators, and advocates. Select interviews will be incorporated into an upcoming CBS News documentary focused on brain health, bringing these stories to a broader global audience.
Brain Economy Lunch with West Health, Rice and Davos Alzheimer's Collaborative
Wednesday, Jan 21 | 12:30 - 2:30pm CET
Location: Brain House at Vital-Lab in the ICON, Symondstrasse 7, Davos-Platz, Switzerland
This working lunch is a collaboration between West Health, The Brain House, and the Global Brain Economy Initiative. The lunch will convene leaders at the forefront of these efforts to begin forming a Brain Economy Place-Based Community of Practice. The purpose is to create a trusted, action-oriented forum for regions and institutions to share tools, insights, best practices, metrics, governance models, and lessons learned, accelerating collective progress while avoiding duplication and fragmentation.
The Future of Value-Based Healthcare
Hosted by the Brain House and Catalight Foundation
Wednesday, Jan 21 | 4:45 - 5:45pm CET
Location: Seehof Davos Hotel – Ferdmann Room
As health systems face rising costs and uneven outcomes, value-based care is moving from concept to necessity. This panel will examine how payers, providers, life sciences, and employers are redefining value—shifting incentives toward prevention, outcomes, and long-term population health impact. Panelists will discuss practical pathways to scale value-based models, align data and payment structures, and integrate innovation across care delivery. The conversation will highlight what’s working today, where friction remains, and how cross-sector leadership can accelerate the transition to more sustainable, outcome-driven healthcare systems.
Speakers:
Bechara Choucair, MD, Executive Vice President and Chief Health Officer, Kaiser Permanente
Mikele Epperly, PhD, Global Integrated Program Leader, Neuroscience, Roche
Jochen Reiser, MD, PhD, President, University of Texas Medical Branch
Dr. Devdutta Sangvai, Secretary for the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services
Moderator: Susan Armiger, CEO, Catalight
Thursday, January 22, 2026
Driving Capital, Innovation & Impact to Advance Brain Health
Hosted by the Brain House
Thursday, Jan 22 | 10:30 - 11:30 am CET
Location: Brain House at Vital-Lab in the ICON, Symondstrasse 7, Davos-Platz, Switzerland
Advancing brain health at scale will require new models that better align capital, innovation, and real-world impact. This session brings together leaders from industry, philanthropy, and neuroengineering to examine how investment and technology can accelerate progress across prevention, diagnosis, and treatment for brain health conditions. Panelists will explore how to move promising science into deployment, mobilize cross-sector capital, and build durable ecosystems that translate innovation into measurable outcomes for patients, health systems, and societies globally.
Speakers:
Tracy Laabs, Head of Innovation and Strategic Partnerships, Wyss Center for Bio and Neuroengineering
Elisabeth Staudinger, Managing Board Chair, Siemens Healthineers
Jesus Mantas, Board Member, Biogen; Former Head of IBM Business Consulting
Moderator: Peter Vanham, Business Journalist and Author of “The New Nature of Business” (with Andre Hoffmann)
Unlocking the Brain Economy: Prioritizing Women's Health in the Global South
Thursday, Jan 22 | 12:15 - 1:15 pm CET
Location: Promenade 73
The Davos Alzheimer’s Collaborative will convene a dialogue with the WE LEAD Lounge focused on women’s brain health as a strategic frontier for India’s economic prosperity.
Speakers:
Rym Ayadi, Founder and President, Euro-Mediterranean Economists Association
Zul Merali, Founder, Aga Khan Brain and Mind Institute
Dr. Antonella Chadha, CEO, Women’s Brain Project
Smriti Zubin Irani, Founder and Chairperson- Alliance for Global Good, Gender Equity and Equality
Moderator: George Vradenburg, Chairman, Davos Alzheimer’s Collaborative
The Brain House is presented to you by the following partners:
