What do closer PHARMA ties to Educational Facilities Mean to Independent Research?
One of my favorite ePeriodicals, FIERCE BIOTECH, The BioTech Industry’s Daily Monitor featured this story by John Carroll today
GSK’s Witty envisions new research ties to biotechs
Anxious to create a more innovative environment to develop new drugs, GlaxoSmithKline CEO Andrew Witty says the pharma giant is exploring ways to link its research facilities around the world to start-up biotech companies that can collaborate on new products.
“Startups could co-locate with us and create a new type of foundation for discovery,” Witty told the International Association of Science Parks conference in Raleigh, home to one of the country’s largest research centers. And he reiterated GSK’s interest in small acquisitions and partnerships to provide a fresh jolt of new ideas for a company in bad need of good drug development programs.
Witty also underscored that the presence of large academic institutions staffed with top researchers won’t be enough to woo companies like GSK in the future. Even more important, he says, is a pro-business attitude “to make the interface between industry and academia porous.”
– check out the report from the News & Observer
Related Articles:
Pharma looks to biotech for R&D model
GSK outlines plans to become more ‘biotech-like’
GSK chief elaborates on biotech strategy
Read more about: strategy, GlaxoSmithKline, Andrew Witty
The quote from Andrew Witty, GKS CEO gave me pause:
“Even more important, is a pro-business attitude to make the interface between industry and academia porous.”
Is a porous, pro-business attitude between industry and academia a good thing? Based our current experience with GKS HPV-vaccine, Cervarix, I’m thinking, perhaps not.
I read this story and followed the links and read the other articles. If you are a business-geek, chip-head like me you can see the symetry of the GSK plan. It makes business sense and takes advantage of the new IT technologies and process to streamline development processes. An old Edwards Deming grad like me throughally approves. The women’s health advocate in me is conncerned that the line between objective research and critical trial results and repoting will be blurred by the technology. GKS has not been the best corporate citizen, old school. GKS in the ‘cloud’ computing environment bare a watchful eye.
