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Open innovation networks between academia and industry: an imperative for breakthrough therapies

Nature Medicine volume 15, pages 502–507 (2009)Cite this article

The demand to bring transformative therapeutics to patients and the escalating costs of doing so are driving the life science industry to seek collaborations with academia to stimulate innovation. Despite the opportunities afforded by working together, companies and universities lack a systematic approach for capturing the full potential of such relationships. Detailed here are a few suggested strategies to help these collaborations succeed.

Since the beginning of 2008 alone, Merck, GlaxoSmithKline, AstraZeneca and Pfizer have all established multimillion-dollar, multiyear collaborations with academic institutes across a number of therapeutic areas4,5. Although some of these relationships are built on long-standing collaborations with academic institutions, the recent increase in the number of these collaborative relationships is part of a major change in strategic direction. These partnerships come at a crucial time for both industry and universities and have the potential to profoundly alter the means by which healthcare is delivered. An important aim for both types of organizations is to close the gap between basic and clinical research, thereby allowing for a more evidence- and outcomes-based approach to therapeutic development that provides real healthcare value to patients. This requires the development of new testing technologies to clearly identify who will benefit most from each therapeutic treatment and determine the conditions under which the benefit will be achieved6,7. Despite the commitment of organizations to foster healthcare innovation along these lines, most companies and universities still lack a systematic and coordinated approach to entering into these relationships or capturing the most value from them.

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Figure 1: The current model for producing biopharmaceutical innovation is economically unsustainable.
Figure 2: How to manage industry-academic partnerships as one would an investment portfolio.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank E. Lium and T. Shen for contributing to the article.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Teri Melese is in the Department of Medicine at the University of California–San Francisco, San Francisco, California, USA.,

    Teri Melese

  2. Salima M. Lin and Julia L. Chang are at IBM Global Business Services, Armonk, New York, USA.,

    Salima M Lin & Julia L Chang

  3. Neal H. Cohen is in the Departments of Anesthesia and Perioperative Care and Medicine, University of California–San Francisco, San Francisco, California, USA.,

    Neal H Cohen

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  1. Teri Melese
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Correspondence to Teri Melese.

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Melese, T., Lin, S., Chang, J. et al. Open innovation networks between academia and industry: an imperative for breakthrough therapies. Nat Med 15, 502–507 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/nm0509-502

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