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Our main motivation for establishing col- Preclinical testing of patient samples
laborative research projects with industry as a means of accelerating drug
stems from the fact that, together, we development
are stronger. Both industry and academic
research as well as patients benefit from Together with HUS and the Finnish Hematology Registry
successful public-private partnerships. We, and Biobank (FHRB), FIMM carries out collaborations with
at FIMM, with our key collaborators, are international pharmaceutical industry partners, assess-
able to quickly provide answers to many ing the efficacy of clinical and preclinical compounds on
problems that industry is currently not ex vivo patient samples to identify promising therapies
equipped to answer alone, and thereby ac- and responding patient groups. Furthermore, we seek
celerate product development. At best, this to identify new indications and to better understand the
can mean getting a new medication or a mechanisms of action of these molecules. We tailor drug
diagnostic test to the market earlier for the testing readouts to optimally match a purpose by using
benefit of the patients. the state-of-the-art high throughput technologies avail-
able at FIMM. These include plate-based assays for cell
The collaborative projects advance FIMM’s strategic viability and toxicity, high content imaging, flow cytom-
research programmes at multiple levels. They address the etry and multiplexed immunohistochemistry. We have also
same key issues as our Grand Challenge programmes and developed assays for monitoring the effects of immuno-
have resulted in high-quality publications and large data oncological compounds. Our researchers have established
resources, such as FinnGen (p. 7). Our doctoral students project agreements with Pfizer, Oncos Therapeutics,
and other researchers who work on industry-funded Targovax and WntResearch, framework agreements with
projects gain valuable experience and contacts that, in Celgene/BMS and Bayer and FIMM-initiated master agree-
the future, can facilitate a possible career transition from ments between the University of Helsinki and both Orion
academia to industry. Pharma and Novartis.
As an example of our efforts to build and intensify collabo- Commercialising research
rations, we have organised a “FIMM meets Pharma event”,
inviting local and international representatives of the With the help of Helsinki Innovation Services Ltd (HIS),
pharmaceutical industry to FIMM. During the COVID-19 FIMM researchers have been able to commercialise their
pandemic efforts to promote our existing collaborations research results through licensing, applying for patents
and to establish new ones continued with “FIMM meets and establishing spinout companies. In addition to Aiforia
Pharma” webinars. (see p. 11), two other spinouts - MediSapiens and Veil.AI,
have been established, in year 2009 and year 2019, respec-
Thanks to these long-term efforts and relationship build- tively.
ing, the magnitude of industrial collaboration projects
and their impact on FIMM funding have been steadily Advancing new technologies
increasing. The income from the company collaborations
in our 2021 budget was close to 11 M€. We have been actively collaborating in technology devel-
opment with Labcyte (acoustic liquid handling systems)
24 | and UPM Biochemicals (cellulose-based gel material for
cancer research purposes). Our recent collaboration with
Intellicyt/Sartorius has facilitated the development of high
throughput flow cytometry (iQue) based assays for drug
testing and precision medicine. Similarly, the collaboration
with NasasBiotech gained us forefront experience with
an emerging fast extracellular vesicle (EV) isolation tech-
nology.
FIMM – Building a Bridge from Discovery to Medicine
