Unicamp's Open Innovation Medicinal Chemistry Center (CQMED) signed this Monday (29) an unprecedented partnership with the Aché and Eurofarma laboratories to research new molecules, aiming to develop anti-infective and cancer-fighting medicines. The agreement inaugurates the CQMED unit accredited by the Brazilian Industrial Research and Innovation Company (EMBRAPII) to carry out research to discover new medicines in the open innovation model.
“It is essential for a University like Unicamp to form this type of partnership with the productive sector and effectively seek innovation, in this case, new drugs that are so important for the population”, stated rector Marcelo Knobel. The project will have an initial investment of R$8,4 million, which will be financed by EMBRAPII and partner companies.
In addition to Knobel, the acting Minister of Education, Maria Helena Guimarães de Castro, was present; the scientific director of the São Paulo State Research Support Foundation (Fapesp), Carlos Henrique de Brito Cruz; the CEO of Embrapii, Jorge Almeida Guimarães; and the coordinator of CQMED, Paulo Arruda; as well as representatives from the pharmaceutical companies Aché and Eurofarma.
According to Paulo Arruda, in addition to the CQMED infrastructure and researchers, the project will count on collaboration with the international consortium Structural Genomics Consortium (SGC), which has been working on the open innovation model for 15 years, involving more than 300 researchers from major universities such as Oxford, North Carolina, Toronto and Frankfurt. The SGC is a non-profit public-private partnership that develops basic research and supports the discovery of new medicines, in a model that does not produce patents and allows unrestricted access to its results. “These are very high-level researchers who are involved in initial research for the development of new drugs,” explained Arruda.
According to EMBRAPII, the framework of this consortium provides that all knowledge acquired up to the validation phase of the therapeutic potential of biological targets will be in the public domain. Once this phase is complete, the knowledge can be used in the identification and development of patentable molecules by pharmaceutical companies.
According to Paulo Arruda, the development of new drugs is a slow process, taking approximately 10 to 12 years to enter the market and has a crucial period in its initial phase. “The majority of drug candidate molecules fail due to lack of efficacy, and this failure is repeated across different companies,” said Arruda.
