Leveraging the Permeable Boundaries of Innovation
The cost of early-stage drug screening and medicinal chemistry now approaches 40% of the overall costs for pharmaceutical R&D1. So it’s not surprising that pharmaceutical companies are now cooperating in the early stages of discovery research, in pre-competitive public-private partnerships (PPP), to combine the expertise of the global biomedical community with the capabilities of the pharmaceutical industry. Leveraging the mutually beneficial opportunities of these more ‘permeable’ boundaries has been at the core of our participation in a range of PPPs, including the Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI) – the world’s largest public-private partnership for health research.
Accelerating the Development of Innovative Medicines

IMI aims to improve health by speeding up the development of innovative medicines particularly in areas where there is an unmet medical or social need. It was established in 2008 by the European Commission and the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations. IMI now has over 800 participating organizations including universities, pharmaceutical and other industries, small and medium-sized enterprises, patient organizations, and medicines regulators.
Boehringer Ingelheim was involved from the very beginning because we valued the importance and unique opportunity of working together with public and private partners, in an open manner, to address these enormous challenges.

Bernd Sommer, Head of CNS Disease Research, is a member of the PRISM coordination team. “Neuroscience is an area where there is still insufficient knowledge about the underlying biological causes of disease and many open questions that need to be answered. This limited understanding is one of the reasons behind the dramatic slowdown in the development of new drugs. The PRISM project is closely aligned to Boehringer Ingelheim’s own approach to Central Nervous System research which focuses on gaining a better understanding of the brain circuitry underlying major untreated neuropsychiatric symptoms. We are optimistic that these biological approaches will lead to the development of effective treatments that patients with these distressing conditions so urgently need.”
For more information visit:
http://www.imi.europa.eu/
http://www.thesgc.org/
http://gpcrconsortium.org/
References
- Paul SM et al. (2010) How to improve R&D Productivity: the pharmaceutical industry’s grand challenge. Nat. Rev. Drug Discov. 9, 203–214.