Alliance Boots, the UK’s leading pharmacy provider, has allied with BioCity, the UK’s leading bioscience incubation company, to establish a new health business incubator.

MedCity, a new subsidiary of BioCity, will provide laboratory and office space for start-up and growing life science companies in the Nottingham Enterprise Zone on the Alliance Boots site at Beeston.

The new medical science incubator will combine BioCity’s experience of creating environments for life science businesses to grow in with Alliance Boots’ long experience of the medical supply chain.

Both companies have roots in Nottingham and have played key roles in the development of the city’s life science business community.

Dr Glenn Crocker (pictured), CEO of BioCity, said: “MediCity is a timely addition to the thriving healthcare and medical technology sector in the UK. I am particularly excited by the benefits Alliance Boots market insights can bring to early-stage companies, with the potential to accelerate development and provide a possible route to market.

“We are interested in speaking to all businesses involved in health, beauty and wellness, whether they are established or still developing a concept.”

“We warmly welcome MediCity onto our site,” said Alex Gourlay, Chief Executive, Health & Beauty Division, Alliance Boots. “Alliance Boots and BioCity’s complementary expertise will attract businesses to MediCity and further enhance our existing world-class innovation hub in Nottingham.”

Alliance Boots has over 3,000 pharmacy-led health and beauty retail businesses in nine countries. BioCity manages business incubation sites in Nottingham, Glasgow and Alderley Edge.

A new ABPI Vaccine Group has replaced the UK Vaccine Industry Group (UVIG), which represented UK vaccine companies for more than a decade.

Changes in the composition of the group include the addition of AstraZeneca and the loss of Sanofi Pasteur MSD.

The ABPI Vaccine Group will work in partnership with the new Public Health England and NHS England bodies to support UK immunisation programmes.

The new industry group has six members: Abbott Healthcare Products, AstraZeneca, GSK, Janssen, Novartis and Pfizer.

The disbanded UVIG also had six members: Baxter Healthcare, GSK, Novartis, Solvay, Sanofi Pasteur MSD and Wyeth (a subsidiary of Pfizer).

Sanofi Pasteur MSD, the manufacturer of Gardasil – recommended by NICE for immunisation against cervical cancer – plays a major role in the UK’s public health vaccination programmes.

Vaccination is an increasingly important strategy in global health protection, as ease of travel has made infectious diseases harder to control. According to the World Health Organisation, vaccines save 2.5 million lives each year.

Stephen Whitehead, Chief Executive of the ABPI said: “This addition to the ABPI strengthens the unity of the biopharmaceutical industry and further underlines the ABPI’s position as the leading life sciences trade association in the UK.”

“Vaccinations against disease play a vital role in improving public health and help protect us from preventable illnesses.”

GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) has said it aims to secure drug volume growth in China and other emerging markets by cutting its prices.

The UK’s largest pharmaceutical company has seen this strategy increase its sales in China by 20% in the last year.

The strategy is part of the company’s ongoing global drive to increase patient access to its products.

According to the GSK’s annual report, introducing price cuts in 2009 has caused unit sales of allergy drug Avamys to increase fivefold in emerging markets, while revenue from Avodart (a drug for enlarged prostate glands) has risen by 76%.

“Price reductions are in many ways very important in driving the access and take-up of healthcare coverage,” said GSK’s Chief Financial Officer, Simon Dingemans (pictured). “We see very good volume response to that, which shows the strategy is working.”

He noted that last year, GSK saw its sales rise by 20% in China (to £1bn) and by 5.6% across all emerging markets (to £1.56bn).

GSK is using the same price-cutting approach in another 10 Asian countries and 40 in Africa.

China is the world’s third largest pharmaceutical market, with annual spending on healthcare set to rise to $1 trillion by 2020.

Pharmaceutical giant Merck Serono and leading industry service provider Quintiles have formed a five-year clinical development partnership.

The unique collaboration aims to optimise productivity in the design and execution of clinical drug trials, speeding the development of new treatment options in Merck Serono’s core therapy areas: neurology, oncology and immunology.

Merck Serono will shape and lead the partnership’s drug development programme; Quintiles will direct the planning and conducting of clinical trials and contribute to ongoing trial design.

Quintiles will be the sole primary provider of Merck Serono’s outsourced drug development services. It will also participate in strategic decisions regarding the development of the pharma company’s portfolio.

The partnership reflects the pivotal role of contract research organisations and other service providers in the global pharmaceutical industry.

“By combining the strengths of Merck Serono and Quintiles, we are creating a new model in clinical development that will unlock the knowledge and insights of both companies,” said Annalisa Jenkins, Executive VP and Head of Global Development and Medical at Merck Serono.

“This is an innovative and unique collaboration that will help to translate the highest-quality science into efficiency and agility throughout our clinical trials, while enhancing our competitive position in an increasingly challenging environment of clinical drug development.”

Tom Pike (pictured), CEO of Quintiles, commented: “We view this as a key step forward not only for our two companies, but for the way the industry approaches the development of new therapies for the patients we ultimately serve.”

Merck Serono is the biopharmaceutical division of Merck, based in Darmstadt, Germany. Quintiles is the largest global provider of drug development and commercial outsourcing services to the pharmaceutical industry.

Steve Turley, Managing Director of Lundbeck, has been re-elected Chair of the European Medicines Group (EMG), the UK voice of pharmaceutical companies based in continental Europe.

Robin Bhattacherjee, General Manager of Actelion, was re-elected vice-Chair of the EMG; and Mike Sumpter, CEO of Servier Laboratories, was elected Treasurer.

Issues highlighted at the EMG’s twelfth AGM included the impact of NHS reform on European-based companies and European perceptions of the UK as a pharmaceutical market and research base.

The EMG’s 15 member companies are Actelion, Almirall, Bayer, Boehringer Ingelheim, Ferring, Lundbeck, Menarini, Merck Serono, Norgine, Novartis, Novo Nordisk, Roche, Sanofi, Servier and UCB.

Steve Turley (pictured) commented: “We have members ranging from the UK’s biggest pharmaceutical companies, through biotechnology specialists to emerging organisations. Yet we all share common challenges and can benefit from being able to view these through a European-focused lens.”

“How the implementation of the NHS reforms affects European-based companies is a key issue this year,” noted Robin Bhattacherjee.

“Upwards of 60% of the medicines our members have introduced in the last decade have not been subject to a NICE health technology appraisal, so... local decision making in the CCGs about the use of these remains a major focus for EMG.”

Mike Sumpter noted: “Globally the UK is viewed as a tough market where innovative new medicines aren’t adopted as readily as similar economies.

“We want to work closely with our NHS stakeholder partners to demonstrate that the UK and the NHS is worth investing in.”

Lundbeck is based in Denmark, Actelion in Switzerland and Servier in France; all three companies have major UK operations.

Diabetes UK has launched a major research programme in partnership with Tesco to develop a vaccine against type 1 diabetes.

Tesco, which has made Diabetes UK its National Charity Partner for this year, hopes to raise £10m for diabetes research through sales and staff fundraising.

While a vaccine to fully prevent type 1 diabetes remains elusive, researchers predict that combining existing treatments will delay the onset and reduce the severity of the condition.

A genetic auto-immune disorder, type 1 diabetes affects 300,000 people in the UK, reducing their life expectancy by an average of 20 years.

Dr Alasdair Rankin, Diabetes UK’s Director of Research, said that a vaccine for Type 1 diabetes is a realistic prospect but will need to be built up to. “There is a huge sense of excitement in the research community that the work being done today is building towards a future where Type 1 diabetes can be stopped in its tracks,” he said.

“It is likely that the first vaccines we see will allow people to live longer before they develop Type 1 diabetes, rather than preventing it entirely. But we know that if people who do develop Type 1 diabetes are treated early with a vaccine then it could provide some benefits that make their condition easier to manage.

“I am really hopeful that with the boost of the funding that has been made possible by our partnership with Tesco, within the next 20 years we will have a vaccine that can stop Type 1 diabetes developing,” he concluded.

A summit meeting to discuss new research into diabetes vaccine development will be used to develop a call for specialist researchers to apply for funding, developing a research programme from next year onward.

The Tesco fundraising campaign will include product promotions that carry a donation to Diabetes UK, donation by customers of club card points, and a donation of 0.0125p for every ATM transaction made at Tesco stores until 28 February 2014.

GSK and MSD (Merck in the US) will reduce the price of their HPV vaccines, which protect against cervical cancer, in the world’s poorest countries.

The two pharma giants have allied to help improve access to HPV prevention in parts of the world where about 275,000 women die from cervical cancer each year.

The low price, about $4.50 per dose, will initially apply to a few million doses made available in Kenya, Ghana, Laos and Madagascar.

The alliance aims to have made the vaccines available to protect 30 million girls in 40 countries by 2020.

In the US, where the vaccine costs $130 per dose, the Center for Disease Control has described the uptake rate as “unacceptably low”. The reduced prices may result in uptake rate in the world’s poorest countries exceeding the US rate.

Dr Seth Berkeley, the alliance’s CEO, described the reduced price as a “ceiling” and predicted that it would drop further due to generic competition from companies in India and China.

The lowest current price for HPV vaccines is $13, paid by the Pan American Health Organization, which supplies medicines to Latin American countries.

The impact of the HPV vaccines could be increased by giving them to younger girls: only two doses are needed to immunise girls aged 9–13, but three are needed for teenage girls.

Both GSK’s Cervarix and MSD’s Gardasil protect against the strands of HPV (human papilloma virus) that cause cervical cancer, though Gardasil also protects against genital warts.

AstraZeneca has appointed BioCity Nottingham to establish a new bioscience hub at its Alderley Park R&D site in Cheshire.

The BioHub will provide high-quality laboratory and office facilities for small pharma and biotech firms involved in drug discovery and development.

The ‘hub’ model of bioscience R&D has already achieved great success in Nottingham, Cambridge, Abingdon and Glasgow, providing benefits to tenant companies, investors and the regional economy.

The first three client companies – Blueberry Therapeutics Ltd, Imagen Biotech Ltd and Redx Anti-Infectives Ltd (a subsidiary of Redx Pharma) have already moved onto the site.

A total of 36,000 square feet of innovation space is available at the BioHub, and tenant companies expect to achieve rapid growth.

The BioCity management team has established hubs in Nottingham and Newhouse, just outside Glasgow.

AstraZeneca is providing the BioHub laboratories and offices, as well as access to restaurants, meeting rooms and conference facilities and to technical equipment.

Dr Glenn Crocker (pictured), CEO of BioCity Nottingham, said: “We are delighted to have been chosen to advise and help establish the BioHub at Alderley Park. We bring many years of experience in developing thriving communities of successful life science companies, and look forward to working closely with the AstraZeneca management team.

“We now have a unique opportunity to build connections between tenant companies based at Alderley Park, Nottingham and Scotland, which could ultimately transform the way life science innovation is achieved.”

While the closure of AstraZeneca’s R&D facility at the Alderley Park site (formerly owned by ICI) caused much concern within the industry, the BioHub plan ensures that the classic site will continue to host pharmaceutical innovation.

GSK has received £5m funding from the Wellcome Trust to support its collaborative work aimed at developing new drugs for diseases of the developing world.

The ‘open innovation’ research facility at Tres Cantos, Madrid, brings GSK’s drug discovery specialists together with 27 external researchers.

The funding will help to build on early-stage research to develop new medicines for tropical diseases including malaria, TB, Leishmaniasis and sleeping sickness.

The Open Lab facility, created by GSK in 2010, aims to develop two significant experimental drugs over the next five years, based on the most promising early-stage research both at Tres Cantos and at GSK.

GSK’s commitment to ‘open innovation’ was signalled by CEO Andrew Witty’s comment in 2012 that “the market has failed” to bring forward new drugs that are needed but will not generate immediate high revenues.

Dr Nick Cammack, Head of GSK’s Tres Cantos Medicines Development Campus, said: “This support highlights a growing recognition that collaborative and open research is the key to tackling these devastating diseases.

“Since adopting an open approach to discovering new medicines for developing world diseases, we’ve hosted some of the world's brightest academic scientists at Tres Cantos. The fusion of their academic excellence with GSK expertise has yielded some really exciting research projects.

“This tremendous show of support from the Wellcome Trust means we now have the potential to start driving these projects further towards finding new medicines.”

The Wellcome Trust is an independent global charitable foundation that supports research to improve human and animal health.

Dr Richard Seabrook, the Trust’s Head of Business Development, commented: “Academic researchers are making incredible progress in our understanding of neglected diseases, yet we’ve still got a bottleneck when it comes to the development of new drugs.

“Taking a more collaborative approach, as GSK have through their open lab, will see these advances reap the full benefit of the industry’s commercial expertise to give us the best chance of securing new treatments for these devastating diseases.”

Lilly Diabetes and Disney Publishing Worldwide (DPW) have expanded their US collaboration to bring educational materials to children with type 1 diabetes and their families worldwide.

The educational resources will include a series of books featuring Mickey Mouse and his friend Coco the monkey, who has type 1 diabetes, to be translated and distributed initially in 18 countries.

The UK has recently seen an increase (as yet unexplained) in type 1 diabetes – a genetic auto-immune condition – among children, and lack of effective patient education has been identified by Diabetes UK as a significant problem.

The materials produced by the Lilly-Disney partnership will be available from diabetes healthcare professionals, and will aim to guide families in meeting the challenge of type 1 diabetes control in children.

Effective control of type 1 diabetes requires a blend of medication (injected insulin), carefully managed diet and exercise, and regular monitoring and dose adjustment. For many families, managing the condition in a child is disruptive and traumatic.

Speakers at the recent UK conference Diabetes: A Call to Action emphasised that a strict focus on blood glucose targets can be counter-productive, and that control needs to be integrated with a healthy and positive lifestyle. The Lilly-Disney materials reflect this philosophy, focusing on management of opportunities rather than on negative restrictions.

“We are excited to be part of this effort to bring informational material about type 1 diabetes to kids around the world who are living with the disease,” said Andrew Sugerman, Executive Vice President of DPW. “Lilly Diabetes’ expertise with the disease, combined with Disney’s tradition of great storytelling, gives us an opportunity to inspire and motivate children and families with type 1 diabetes.”

Andrew Hodge, Vice President, International of Lilly Diabetes, commented: “Lilly Diabetes’ objective is to bring safety, health, comfort and a bit of magic to children worldwide. We saw the positive impact our collaboration with Disney Publishing Worldwide had on families living with type 1 diabetes in the US over the last two years, and we are excited to expand our reach globally.”