Stevenage, UK, November 21 2012 – The time of ‘over-restrictive inward-looking practices’ has gone, bringing many benefits for life sciences innovation, according to Patrick Vallance, President, Pharmaceuticals R&D at GlaxoSmithKline, speaking at ‘Open Innovation in Action’ at Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst (SBC) on November 15 2012. Delegates at the conference at SBC, the UK’s first open innovation bioscience campus, debated and discussed how to make this important externalisation approach work, successes so far and the challenges ahead.
Following on from these comments, second keynote speaker Stefan Lindegaard, open innovation expert and author, described how he has worked across diverse sectors, encouraging companies to become ‘competitively unpredictable’, as one CEO described it. He also raised the intriguing idea that large firms should be more innovative than smaller ones, with their size providing some protection should certain approaches fail.
The conference, which attracted over 150 delegates, also featured sessions on open access to research literature, crowd funding and social media, as well as the implications of open innovation on intellectual property, contracts and drug discovery. Speakers came from a range of organisations, including GE Life Sciences, Cambridge Enterprise, the Medical Research Council, Scrip Intelligence, the Wellcome Trust, Philips Research, Unilever R&D and Innocentive.
‘Many thanks to everyone - delegates, speakers, sponsors1 and our stakeholders - for making this inaugural conference such a great success,’ said Dr Martino Picardo, CEO of Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst. ‘Open innovation is clearly already changing business practices in the pharma and biotech sector, and there is huge enthusiasm for embracing it further. Here at SBC we will continue to develop our open innovation initiatives via challenges and calls, as well as awards and the launch of our portal, which is expected in the first half of 2013.’
1 Thanks to our sponsors: BioCentury, innoget, Original Ventures, Potter Clarkson and seralab.
For more information, please contact:
Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst
Martino Picardo, CEO +44 (0)1438 906906
Emma Palmer Foster, Strategic Communications Consultant +44 (0)7880 787185
comms@stevenagecatalyst.com
About Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst
Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst is the UK’s first open innovation bioscience campus, pioneering a unique culture to drive early stage bioscience technology and company development, and building a thriving community. It is backed by £38m of funding from its founding partners – GlaxoSmithKline, the Wellcome Trust, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, the Technology Strategy Board and the former East of England Development Agency. Consisting of an Incubator, an Accelerator and a Hub, covering 60,000 sq ft of laboratory, office and networking space, the independent facility houses a range of companies, from virtual and start-up firms to those which are more established, as well as other organisations. Located on the GlaxoSmithKline Stevenage site, Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst is in the unique position of operating in proximity to the expertise and resources of a major pharmaceutical company, close to both London and Cambridge. For more information, please go to www.stevenagecatalyst.com.
About Open Innovation
Firms using Open Innovation (OI) combine their own R&D with externally sourced ideas and expertise. OI is characterised by highly effective use of connections and networks to exchange knowledge and ideas, external partners being involved at all stages of product development, equitable win-win business relationships, and new business models to maximise the value of intellectual property and other assets. Examples in various sectors have shown that the benefits of OI include reduced time to market for new products and services, access to new markets, improved innovation success rates and increased profits. SBC will promote use of Open Innovation within the life sciences sector, connecting SMEs with an active network consisting of GlaxoSmithKline and its other stakeholders, academia, charities, other businesses and funding bodies. The term ‘Open Innovation’ and related research into its practice have been developed extensively by Professor Henry Chesbrough, Executive Director of the Program in Open Innovation at the University of California, Berkeley (http://openinnovation.berkeley.edu).
About Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst’s stakeholders
Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst’s stakeholders are GlaxoSmithKline (www.gsk.com), the Wellcome Trust (www.wellcome.ac.uk), the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills (www.bis.gov.uk), the Technology Strategy Board (www.innovateuk.org) and the former East of England Development Agency (http://www.eeda.org.uk/) Please reply with ‘Unsubscribe’ in the e mail subject box if you do not want to receive information from us
Emma Palmer Foster
Strategic Communications Consultant
Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst
m: +44 (0) 7880 787185
http://www.stevenagecatalyst.com/
@SteBioCat
Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst
Gunnels Wood Road
Stevenage
Hertfordshire SG1 2FX
