[Ip-health] Cancer Research UK invites industry to buy results of research from "crack teams"

[Michelle Childs]

<snip>
Youlton said any potential buyer need have no concerns about the
exclusivity of the intellectual property it was purchasing. All
participants have "pre-agreed to divest all the information" into the
company, he said.

Stressing that this was not a charitable project designed to expand
knowledge for general use within the cancer research community he
said: "There is one seat at the table (for the buyer)."

Broadly speaking, CRT was looking for any buyer to invest the same
amount - 500,000 pounds - as the charity was investing, he said.

The intellectual property would only revert back to CRT if the
participating pharma company decides not to continue the research at
the end of a two-year period.


http://www.apmhealtheurope.com/story.php?numero=3D11656
  Wednesday, 28 May 2008 14:08 GMT
Cancer Research UK invites industry to buy results of research from
"crack teams"
by Nick Smith

LONDON, May 28 (APM) - Cancer Research UK on Wednesday launched the
first in a planned series of collaborations of leading scientists and
invited pharma companies to step-in and buy the resulting intellectual
property.

Under the scheme, the charity's commercial arm, Cancer Research
Technology (CRT) is putting together "crack teams" of up to five
leaders in their highly specialised fields to work together to bring
on an early stage of cancer research.

Launching the initiative at a London press briefing, CRT's senior
business manager, Simon Youlton said the projects are time limited to
two years, over which period Cancer Research UK will spend 500,000
pounds (630,000 euros) funding each team's research.

Individual pharma companies are now being invited to buy into the
first of the projects with a view to taking full ownership of the
resulting knowledge, he continued.

The targets for research have been chosen because they have reached
maturity in pure research in the area to the point when it can be
moved into drug discovery, Youlton said.

NOT BLUE SKY

The first team is looking at cellular senescence as a target and
started work on May 1. It is headed by Cancer Research UK scientist
and professor of molecular oncology at Glasgow University, Nicol Keith.

At the conference, Keith said the consortium (see below) has
"identified opportunities for translational research aimed at
delivering compounds for drug development (in senescence)".

Keith stressed the business angle of CRT's approach. "This is not blue-
sky research this is about making ideas work in a very practical way."

He said senescence was an "emerging developing field ... with just
enough information" to exploit in a commercial manner.

It also offered a potentially very promising route to tackle cancer,
particularly in melanoma, and was likely to be complimentary to
existing therapies, he added.

ONE SEAT AT THE TABLE, =A3500,000

CRT argues that in addition to a novel but synergistic combination of
talents it has used its influence to pull together a collaboration of
scientists in a way that was difficult for pharma companies to achieve.

It also says it model will readily bridge the academia-industry divide.

All the research resulting from the collaboration is owned by a
"company", which is up for sale to pharma at point during the two-year
project.

Youlton said any potential buyer need have no concerns about the
exclusivity of the intellectual property it was purchasing. All
participants have "pre-agreed to divest all the information" into the
company, he said.

Stressing that this was not a charitable project designed to expand
knowledge for general use within the cancer research community he
said: "There is one seat at the table (for the buyer)."

Broadly speaking, CRT was looking for any buyer to invest the same
amount - 500,000 pounds - as the charity was investing, he said.

The intellectual property would only revert back to CRT if the
participating pharma company decides not to continue the research at
the end of a two-year period.

Nicholas Adams, director of business development for UK cancer
biotech, Antisoma, and industry representative at the launch, said the
model may also help keep cancer development flowing when venture
funding for biotech was tight.

Speaking to APM he said he was confident the package would persuade
individual companies to unlock their purses. The problems of
intellectual protection were overcome and companies did not have to
negotiate with disparate bodies conducting the research.

CRT and the collaborations would be open to other business models
including a royalty-based scheme, he said.
Michelle Childs
Head of European Affairs
  Knowledge Ecology International
www.keionline.org / www.cptech.org
Phone:+44(0)207 226 6663 ex 252
Email: michelle.childs@cptech.org