Partners offers industry partners access to a living laboratory
Academic-Industry Alliances
Academic-industry relationships have emerged as a key force in the development and commercialization of biomedical and healthcare innovations. Defined as arrangements between academic health systems, like Partners HealthCare, which includes investigators, clinicians and administrators, and for-profit corporations (“industry”) in which value is exchanged. Value often includes academic-based intellectual property or cutting edge research in return for financial support or compensation, or access to proprietary technology and services from industry. This type of public-private collaboration is based on the promise of potential opportunities to develop technologies that benefit the integrated health system and can be brought to the marketplace for the benefit of the broader healthcare community.
Fundamentally, the relationships are driven by the recognition that academia and industry are unique and both come to the table with different but complementary perspectives and skill sets. It is this collective learning from each other that adds the most value. Partners HealthCare realizes significant value from industry in that such collaborators can provide commercially validated products and services to advance our core mission – research, education, patient care and charitable, community service. In collaborating, industry can provide financial and personnel resources in addition to proprietary technologies and services to accelerate the development of academic science and technology. The market and industry insight offered by industry leadership is also instrumental in driving the value of academic translational research.
Partners as a Living Laboratory
The integrated healthcare delivery system of Partners HealthCare may be considered a “living laboratory” in which industry firms can leverage the clinical expertise of world class physicians, researchers, and leadership; identify critical healthcare challenges; develop hypotheses, and design, test and implement solutions that address those challenges. Leveraging industry contributions ensures a more rapid development cycle and insight into the commercial development process. Partners HealthCare offers solutions and services that meet the needs of its internal environment, and the industry partner will have cutting-edge products that can be commercialized to the broader community for widespread enhanced benefit. The ultimate goal is for these relationships to contribute to the broader mission of supporting innovative research and the broad translation of academic science and technology to the patient bedside.
Partners as a Resource for Industry
Partners HealthCare provides a unique environment and resource for industry because it spans the continuum of healthcare delivery and essentially all facets of a healthcare provider network. We offer direct access to patients and clinical care providers (physicians, nurses, and other clinicians), which are two vital constituents/customers within the overall healthcare ecosystem. Through its research and clinical communities, Partners HealthCare provides domain expertise and clinical context for industry solutions where knowledge and understanding of clinical, research and administrative workflows are critical to the product development process, which includes planning, design, testing, validation and optimization of the end commercial product.
Strategies and Types of Academic-Industry Alliances
Academic-Industry alliances are established at many different levels depending on the research and commercial needs of the interested parties, which can range from transactional (e.g., sponsored research, licenses and consulting agreements) to strategic (e.g., broad, long-term, visionary relationships developing next-generation solutions).
- Consulting Arrangement: industry compensates academic institution or faculty member(s) in exchange for expert guidance, counsel and advice.
- Research Support: industry provides sponsored research funding to support academic-based research, often in exchange for an option to license new intellectual property, access to data, etc.
- Licensing Transaction: industry obtains rights to academic institutional owned intellectual property for commercialization purposes. Industry firms become aware of academic technology through publications, presentations, existing relationships, and marketing.
- Strategic Alliance: industry and academic institution establishes broad long-term relationship, often consisting of significant financial or resource contributions from industry or from both parties, depending on the scope of the collaboration. Broader strategic alliances are typically more complex to establish, manage and sustain.
The process often begins with something of value such as a specific, tangible asset (e.g. intellectual property) or high-level vision (e.g. thought leadership). The valuable asset or vision is then translated into a coherent story, otherwise known as the “pitch”, which clearly articulates the value proposition of a potential relationship. Viable industry candidates are then identified through various channels, including internal academic/clinical/research champions, market research and diligence, or existing industry relationships. Once appropriate industry partners are identified, discussions are initiated to seek alignment of interests, with the goal of defining and determining the scope of the agreement as well as business and financial terms. Lastly, a legal contract is drafted, negotiated, and executed to memorialize the final agreement.
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