Jan H. Spaas was born in Bilzen (Belgium). His high school majors were Latin and Mathematics. During this period, he was a passionate horseback rider, which was translated in winning a 2-fold bronze medal at European Championships and 3-fold bronze medal at Belgian Championships for juniors and young riders (show jumping).

He graduated as a veterinarian in 2010 at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine of Ghent University (Belgium) and obtained his PhD at the Dept. of Comparative Physiology and Biometrics of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Ghent University. In 2012 he co-founded Global Stem cell Technology (acquired by Boehringer Ingelheim in 2020) to develop regenerative therapies for the treatment of musculoskeletal diseases in horses and dogs and was the General Manager for 10 years.
In 2020 he was appointed visiting professor at the Dept. of Morphology, Imaging, Orthopedics, Rehabilitation and Nutrition from the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Ghent.