Business


A


B


Figure 2: The Core Model AThis model has three major elements: the ‘core’, the ‘bridge’ and the ‘periphery’. In a biotechnology start-up company, the core represents the company’s internal resources and people who are hired because they have assets that are directly related to the core’s objective – making drugs. The core needs a strong leader who is capable of keeping the enterprise focused and is able to secure collaboration with external people. The ideas of the core are protected by patenting and secrecy. The bridge represents the immediate collaborators of the core and the private institutions to which the core has indirect access through the external collaborators. The bridge contains external scientists interested in similar problems or whose research would be enriched as a result of the collaboration. It also includes consultants and Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) members (non-founders) working in exclusive and non-exclusive ways. The periphery contains the institutions/agencies interested in what the core has to offer for the benefit of society, as well as the funding and regulatory structures that support the core and the bridge. The periphery is an open, public and co-operative system. The goal of the core is to absorb efficiently and legally as much relevant knowledge and information as possible from its surroundings in three ways: via the leverage of the assets, professional backgrounds and connections of the people within the core; via the assets, connections and expertise of the external collaborators within the bridge; and via the support, relevant public knowledge and know-how within the periphery. B Illustration of the roles of selected people involved in the development of bortezomib using the core model. Source: Sánchez-Serrano, I. Success in Translational Research: Lessons from the Development of Bortezomib. Nature Reviews Drug Discovery, 5 (2):107-14 (2006)


different ways, further knowledge relevant to a better understanding of the biological mechanisms associated to the proteasome and its inhibitors while providing animal models and validation. They actually allowed the company to save an enormous amount of time, human capital, infras- tructure and money, and fundamentally acted as a ‘Bridge’ or ‘catalyst’ between the ‘Core’ and the ‘Periphery’ – that is, all those public resources available in society to sponsor and foster innova- tion with the objective of creating economic and healthcare benefits for its members. The ‘Periphery’ includes federally-funded agencies, advocacy groups, philanthropic organisations, consortia, regulators and all those organisations interested in the well-being of society. In summary, ProScript developed bortezomib through a ‘Core’ modus operandi using knowledge transfer (collab-


46


oration established with external people to exchange assets), knowledge integration (incorpo- ration and assimilation of external assets) and knowledge translation (the conversion of all, inter- nal and external, assets into a commercial thera- peutic product). Myogenics/ProScript carried out collaboration


with outside groups exceptionally well, as explained by the Core Model, and so particularly benefited from these collaborations at crucial points, both when the company needed scientific knowledge to move forward and when it lacked the necessary economic resources. Even though today some companies form collaborations in their programmes, these collaborations are more oppor- tunistic than planned. More importantly, there is little understanding, in all the collaborative sides, of the dynamics and benefits of such collaborations


Drug Discovery World Spring 2018


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