European Investment Fund joins with Leuven to create drugs centre

Centre formed

The Catholic University of Leuven and the European Investment Fund (EIF) have agreed a €8 million partnership to set up a Centre for Drug Design and Discovery (CD3) that will discover compounds for targets from the university, in a bid to bridge the gap between academic biomedical research and the needs of industry.

CD3 will source targets from research groups in the university and from external partners such as other research institutions.  It will seek to collaborate with and/or license results to the pharmaceutical and biotech industry.

The aim is to enhance the value of the intellectual property developed at Leuven and at the same time address the need for new and safer drugs to populate the pipelines of the pharmaceutical and biotech industry.

The Catholic University of Leuven regards itself as a pioneer of technology transfer in Europe. Its technology transfer office KU Leuven Research & Development, was founded way back in 1972. Currently, it has a portfolio of over 60 active spin-off companies with  a combined turnover of around €350 million and employing more than 2,000 people.  

“In this landmark operation, EIF’s investment will permit the creation of a leading technology transfer operation,” said Francis Carpenter, Chief Executive of the European Investment Fund. “This investment allows EIF to address an unmet need in the field of commercialisation of IP from universities.”