A Study on the Gap in Awareness of Alliances between Pharmaceutical Companies and Venture Businesses
Masafumi Shimokawa, Kazuishi Sekino, Satoshi Toyoshima (Laboratory of Regulatory Science, Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Musashino University)
Kazumichi Kobayashi (Former Chief Researcher, Pharmaceutical and Industrial Policy Research Institute)
(No. 65: Published in May 2015)
Despite talk of the importance of open innovation, it is difficult to say that active alliances have been formed between pharmaceutical companies and drug discovery ventures in Japan. The so-called "valley of death," where seeds fall between the role of academia and clinical development at companies, has been mentioned on various occasions as a cause of this situation. However, we have considered that differences in awareness, gaps in recognition, and a lack of mutual understanding between academia, venture companies, and pharmaceutical companies may also be a major impediment to this problem.
In this study, we conducted interviews and questionnaires with both venture companies and pharmaceutical companies in order to objectively analyze and assess the extent of the gap in awareness and recognition. As a result, the gap in awareness or recognition was found in various aspects, such as the reasons for non-formation of alliances and the timing of alliances. The venture companies lacked understanding or awareness of how to evaluate pharmaceutical companies and how to select appropriate alliance partners, and the pharmaceutical companies lacked explanation of the reasons for rejection of alliance proposals and provision of information on their alliance intentions and the content of the fields and technologies in which they are interested. The cause of the gap in awareness and understanding was considered to be the lack of understanding or awareness by venture companies and the lack of explanation and information provided by pharmaceutical companies.