Pharma-sponsored studentships down in the UK

Falling: pharma support

The Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI) says this is a cause for concern. While the industry has extensive collaborative research links with the UK university science base, there are growing signs that it is under threat.

“While the industry continues to work closely with universities, there is a worrying decline in the level of activity,” said Philip Wright, ABPI Director of Science and Technology.

“There have been real benefits from these collaborations for both academia and industry, with a two-way flow of skills and knowledge.”

Underlying reasons for the declining collaboration include escalating costs, and the increasing difficulty in negotiating contracts, including the issue of intellectual property ownership.

Given the interdependence between pharmaceutical sector research and academic bioscience, the ABPI believes it is critical not only to address these issues but also to restore industry’s overall confidence in the UK as a place to conduct research, after a recent survey it carried out in cooperation with the employer’s organisation the CBI showed it to have fallen to a worryingly low level (see Drugs firms lose confidence in UK, 3 April 2008).

“With increasing competition for biomedical leadership from Asian economies, it is vital that government and industry unite to restore confidence and maximise the UK’s chances in the global race for pharmaceutical innovation,” said Richard Baker, ABPI Director General.

The survey considered the three main types of collaboration between industry and universities: PhD studentships, where students carry out research projects jointly between a university and a company; postdoctoral grants, where jointly funded research programmes are undertaken between companies and universities, including exchanges of personnel; and industrial placements, where undergraduate students work within companies for usually one year as part of their degree studies.

The total value of all of the collaborations reported in the survey is over GBP65 million.

The ABPI survey shows that in 2007 the top ten universities – Manchester, Cambridge, Imperial, Oxford, Bristol, Leeds, Nottingham, King’s College London, Sheffield and University College London – have just over half the PhD studentships, and 80 per cent of the studentships are shared between 30 per cent of the 78 universities in the survey.