GHP January 2016

ghp January 2016 | 9 Chinese and UK Companies, Universities and Organisations Collaborate for £2 Billion of Healthcare Trade Deals Speaking at the Life Science and Healthcare Business Forum, Minister for Life Sciences George Freeman remarked that the collaborations will provide benefits that go considerably further than the populations of China and the UK, and will have a positive effect on health globally: “With a population of more than one billion and a rapidly developing economy, China is set to become the world’s fastest growing healthcare market. Today’s £2 billion trade package for UK exports in research, hospital construction, training, diagnostics and drug discovery shows the huge potential of UK/Chinese Life Science trade.” The Minister said both countries have long been admired for producing some of the world’s leading aca- demics and scientists, whose advances have saved and improved the lives of millions of people suffering from serious diseases such as cancer: “Cancer is the number one killer of people in the UK and China and like many nations we are in hot pursuit to find an effective treatment. Which is why collabora- tions such as those being announced today between Warwick University and Sun Yat-Sen University Cancer Centre on training and research to co-develop anti-can- cer treatments are so important.” UK patients will also benefit from China’s technological advancements with deals such as Cerno and United Im- aging who collaborated to bring the most recent oncolo- gy imaging technology to the UK. The Minister stressed that the sharing of expertise will flow both ways. UK organisations Glasgow Caledonian University, Annie Barr and Kings College London are supporting the training of Chinese health professionals in a number of cities in China as the Chinese government aims to train 150,000 doctors and 2 million nurses by 2020. The Minister then said: “All of these collaborations announced today show how Chinese and UK organisations recognise each other’s potential. Together we have a real opportunity to make a difference to people’s lives and improve the health outcomes for millions across the globe. “UK leadership in Life Science is helping to support both UK economic growth and the sustainable develop- ment of emerging economies. This is a win-win for the NHS, UK and China.” UK-China Research and innovation toolkit Also in October, Baroness Neville-Rolfe announced the publication of a toolkit to enable UK-China research and innovation collaboration. She said that the UK’s strengths in research and tech- nology commercialisation complement the exciting work happening in China, outlining the following examples: • The UK is home to 4 of the world’s top 10 universi- ties – Cambridge, UCL, Oxford and Imperial College London – and 30 of the top 200; • These universities are equipped with first class facilities and talent, producing research that chang- es people’s lives around the world. According to industry data, 16% of the most cited papers in the world are first published in the UK; and • The UK is also a world leader in technology com- mercialisation. We have strong university-industry links, and a track record of creating successful spin out companies. Our companies and universi- ties have experience taking innovation to markets across the world; The Minister then went on to say: “China is also now a leading global source of funding for scientific research, with R&D spending reaching 2.9% of GDP in 2014. Many of us in the IP sector have been More than £2 billion of healthcare trade deals and collaborations have were signed between Chi- nese and UK companies, universities and organisations during President Xi Jinping’s state visit to Britain in October this year. amazed at the output of this research in China, with over 900,000 invention patent applications to the State Intellectual Property Office last year alone. “[As I mentioned earlier], the UK and China are jointly investing in £200 million of science and innovation pro- jects over 5 years. But collaboration across borders can be challenging. Unfamiliar academic cultures, business environments and IP systems can create barriers to joint research. “The benefits of solving these problems are significant. Citation rates are higher for papers co-authored by British and Chinese scientists than for papers written in either country independently. Cross-border licensing of IP has unlocked revenues otherwise unavailable to both parties in a licensing agreement. “This is why the Toolkit we are launching today is so important. It provides a clear framework for negotiating how IP will be managed in joint research projects. It includes a decision guide and translated model collab- oration agreements. It is based on the Lambert Toolkit which was created for domestic collaborations, but has been specifically adjusted for both UK and Chinese law.” © Crown copyright