A new joint report from the Medicines Discovery Catapult and the UK BioIndustry Association (BIA), released today (Thursday 18 January) has revealed insights into the productivity of the UK’s drug discovery community.
Drug discovery
The ‘State of the Discovery Nation 2018’ follows the launch of the Life Sciences Industrial Strategy in the latter part of 2017. It focuses on the small-to-medium enterprise community within drug development and finds that the UK has strong scientific foundations, however, it also reveals that in this time of industry change urgent action is needed to make the R&D model more productive.
With an ageing population and increasing rates of chronic diseases, the financial burden of disease is rising faster than GDP. Therefore, it is imperative to develop more cost-effective medicines.
However, according to figures published in the report ‘Clinical Development Success Rates 2006–2015’, around 40% of new drugs fail at the first in-human trial stage with the majority of other drugs failing at other various stages of development. This rate of failure has led to a decrease in the number of drugs launched per $1 billion of R&D spend over the past 40 years, as reported by Deloitte.
This new report incorporates survey results and over 100 in-depth interviews with senior executives of UK drug discovery companies, from which is has been realised that global R&D productivity is under exceptional pressure. Several opportunities are open to UK companies to help address this issue and to reshape the medicines discovery process to develop medicines greatly needed by patients.
The report highlights that:
- Global R&D productivity is under unprecedented pressure
- The model of medicines R&D must be radically reshaped to meet patient needs
- A key problem is reliance on using inadequate models for human diseases
- Commercialising emerging technology will require new models of collaboration
- Data science is now indispensable to medicines R&D: research data is now generated in such high volumes that the ability to harness it has become a critical factor in developing new medicines
- It is imperative for the UK to provide industry with straightforward, well-governed access to consented patient data and human tissue samples – this is an acute problem for SMEs
The report also found that the UK’s R&D community is highly fragmented in life sciences. Universities, teaching hospitals, medical charities, large pharmaceuticals and SMEs each possess some of the capabilities and expertise required for drug development. Consequently, collaboration is essential to develop new medicines successfully.
As part of this report the Medicines Discovery Catapult and the BIA are calling on the community to address additional cross-cutting themes that require multi-stakeholder solutions:
- Maximise the supply of investable intellectual property
- Create more agile routes to enable small companies to work together easily, leading to clinical trials
- Increase access to stratified human trials
- Address the skills gap
- Address the gap in follow-on funding
“The UK has a strong heritage in medicines R&D and a high-profile strategy for our industry. However, in a globally competitive environment, we must now pull together nationally to support the innovators and build the best ecosystem for medicines discovery in the world,” said Chris Molloy, chief executive of the Medicines Discovery Catapult. “It’s our mission, along with our sister Catapult in Cell & Gene Therapy, to help make this happen, which is why we’ve harnessed the intelligence of the community in this report, and have clear actions underway to catalyse positive change.”
“Innovation drives medicines development, and SMEs are at the heart of this, thanks to their agility and outlook,” added Steve Bates OBE, chief executive officer of the BIA. “However, SMEs fit into a complicated landscape and need help to navigate it. Issues such as access to high quality Intellectual Property, support structures, stratified trials, funding and skills require a systemic approach and can’t be fixed by any one organisation working alone. That’s why we, along with the Medicines Discovery Catapult, are committed to working with others to create long-term solutions to these issues, which will drive productivity and further success in the important years ahead.”
“Medicines R&D is critical for the health of the UK,” emphasized Professor Dame Nancy Rothwell, president and vice-chancellor of The University of Manchester, speaking at the launch event in Alderley Park. “This report provides vital insights for the SME and academic communities for the development of new medicines at a time of fast scientific and industrial change. It also lays out the clear role of the Medicines Discovery Catapult. Its location in the northwest life sciences cluster will enable the UK community to access science and clinical expertise which can help the SME community to pioneer a new drug discovery process. Ultimately, this innovation will lead to medicines from the UK reaching patients faster, with lower risk of failure, maintaining our heritage position as one of the world’s best places for developing new targeted, high value medicines.”
Aisling Burnand OBE, chief executive officer of the Association of Medical Research Charities added: “The UK’s medical research charity sector plays a vital role in the UK’s R&D. We know first-hand that patients, their relatives, and carers have unique experience which is invaluable to this process. This important report is a step towards enabling patients and medical research charities to be involved at the heart of R&D. It gives a shared vision for a humanised future of drug discovery.”