New B.C. centre aims to span drug development gap

A new academic centre based at the University of British Columbia aims to bridge the well-identified gap in Canada – the so-called “Valley of Death” – between university discovery and commercialization.

The Centre for Drug Research and Development, in the works for several years, is a non-profit agency supported by four B.C. universities, three teaching hospitals, the B.C. Cancer Agency and several biotechnology companies in the province. The centre received a boost recently in the form of an $8-million award from the Canadian Foundation for Innovation. The CFI award, when matched by the province and other sources, will bring total funding for the new centre to $20 million.

“We want to drive development,” said Natalie Dakers, the centre’s chief executive officer and former head of Neuromed Technologies.

“We need to set up core facilities, to provide equipment and management help so researchers can further develop discoveries.”

Early-stage venture capital financing for scientific discoveries is scarce in Canada, and only 15 percent of new start-up companies received such financing in the 2004 fiscal year, according to the Association of University Technology Managers. The goal of the new centre is to develop early drug discoveries to a point, before clinical trials, where they may be of interest to outside investors, including biotechnology and pharmaceutical firms.

The B.C. initiative consists of two entities: an academic wing called the Drug Research Institute, where researchers will advance promising new discoveries; and Drug Development Inc., the corporate arm that will choose which of those discoveries it feels are most likely to be commercially successful. These will then be provided with further management expertise.

“One of our key objectives is that we use business criteria for identifying the opportunities and managing the development … we want to make sure this is done according to business and corporate norms,” said Angus Livingstone, managing director of UBC’s industry liaison office.

Any money that the drug institute makes from successful developments will be channelled back into the research institute.

Ms. Dakers said big universities across North America are all trying to address the gap between university discoveries and commercialization. It is a difficult and expensive task, forcing many institutions to work together and share infrastructure. “There is more openness to sharing. People are aware of the competition out there and realize that this is hard to do solo,” she said, adding that she is not aware of any other model that so thoroughly integrates “the mechanics of commercialization” the way the B.C. centre does.

Meanwhile, the National Research Council has been developing a proposal for a similar but larger initiative, a National Centre for Accelerated Drug Development, to be based at the MaRS Centre in downtown Toronto.

But the NRC proposal, developed with key officials from the University of Toronto and Toronto’s University Health Network, is at an earlier stage. (At the time University Affairs went to press, the plan had not yet received a commitment of federal money.)

Like the B.C. centre, the national centre would make advanced technologies and experienced managers accessible to researchers, but the organizational base for the national centre would be outside of the universities. “Universities are very good at developing ideas and trainees, but it requires a specialized environment that is not part of the university to take [discoveries] to the next step,” said John Challis, vice president, research, at the University of Toronto.

The national centre would operate as a “public sector organization,” said Roman Szumski, the NRC’s vice-president of research. He said the next step in planning is to connect with similar-thinking groups in Montreal and Vancouver – the two other cities with significant pharmaceutical and biotechnology sectors.

“The global biopharma business is huge and incredibly competitive and Canada is small. We believe a national approach is preferable to a series of regional initiatives,” he said.