Glaxo Grant Program's Future Uncertain While Staff Assesses Grantees' Success

Last spring, the British pharmaceutical firm Glaxo Inc. launched an ambitious $10 million Cardiovascular Discovery Grants Program. The company, whose United States office is located in Research Triangle Park, N.C., announced 20 grants, each providing a maximum of $250,000 per year for three years to a researcher or team (see accompanying table). The proclaimed purpose of the program: to support research that may lead to the discovery of therapeutic agents for treatment or prevention of cardiovascular disorders. Among the grant proposals received by Glaxo, the 20 winning entries showed the highest "likelihood of at least pointing the way" to new cardiovascular drugs, says Don Kirksey, director, business opportunities for the firm. But scientists anticipating a request for proposals for Glaxo's next round of grants may have to wait a long time. The company has not yet decided whether to support more researchers or, alternatively, to limit the program to the 20 grants already awarded. And it doesn't appear that Glaxo will be making its determination any time soon. "No date has been set for that decision," says Kirksey. The Glaxo official says the verdict, which will be a consensus of "many people in the organization, including R&D personnel in the U.K. as well as the U.S.," will hinge on "whether or not we were successfully able to develop effective collaborations" between the academic researchers who received the first round of grants and the firm's own research laboratories. A major determining factor, he says, will be a cost analysis - an assessment of "what we have gained versus what we paid" to fund the biomedical research scientists and physicians. Such a funding program, Kirksey notes, involves considerable labor costs over and above the $10 million investment: "You need people to monitor the project, especially R&D people, and they're very busy," he says. Using Glaxo's R&D scientists to work in conjunction with the grant recipients means asking them to take time from their primary responsibilities at the firm, a "tremendous internal burden." Name(s) Institution(s) Joseph A. Beavo Department of Pharmacology, University of Washington David E. Clapham and Ernest Peralta Department of Pharmacology, Mayo Clinic; Department of Biochemistry, Harvard University Jackie D. Corbin Department of Molecular Physiology, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine Wolfgang H. Dillmann Department of Endocrinology, University of California, San Diego William John Elliott Department of Medicine, University of Chicago Fredric S. Fay and Mitsuo Ikebe Department of Physiology, University of Massachusetts Medical School; Departments of Physiology and Biophysics, Case Western Reserve Univ. Heidi Elizabeth Hamm Department of Physiology, University of Illinois at Chicago College of Medicine Edwin K. Jackson Department of Pharmacology, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine Michael Kahn and Michael E. Johnson Department of Chemistry, University of Illinois at Chicago; College of Pharmacy,University of Illinois at Chicago Alan J. Kinniburgh Department of Human Genetics, Roswell Park Memorial Institute Joe M. McCord Department of Biochemistry, University of South Alabama College of Medicine Anthony R. Means Center for Rehabilitation, Baylor College of Medicine Walter L. Miller Department of Pediatrics/Metabolic Research Unit, University of California, San Francisco L. Bruce Pearce Department of Pharmacology, Boston University School of Medicine Bruce R. Pitt and Paul Davies Department of Pharmacology, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine David J. Riley Department of Pulmonology, University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey/Robert Wood Johnson Medical School Michael R. Rosen Department of Pharmacology, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons John Sutko, Luc Ruest, and Koert Gerzon Department of Pharmacology, University of Nevada School of Medicine; Department of Chemistry, University of Sherbrooke; Department of Pharmacology, Indiana University School of Medicine Ian L. Taylor Department of Gastrointestinal Medicine, Duke University Medical Center Carl L. Tipton Department of Biochemistry/ Biophysics, Iowa State University But while this commitment to academic research does involve some risk, Glaxo officials are hopeful that there are benefits to be reaped from it as well. Among the conditions of a Glaxo award is the proviso that the firm receive an "exclusive, worldwide, royalty-bearing license" to any intellectual property resulting from the funded research. This condition, Kirksey says, represents "a commitment on our part to engage in the development of the compound [resulting from an awardee's work], and not let it languish somewhere." Another gain Glaxo hopes to make from the collaboration with scientists at universities and hospitals is the "assurance that internally, we're moving in the right direction" with the company's own research projects, says Kirksey. The firm hopes the grant program will help to "solidify the connections we've already made" with the academic community. Award recipients, too, anticipate extramonetary gains from the collaboration. "I've already gone to the Glaxo labs for a visit, and got criticisms which were very constructive," says awardee Jackie D. Corbin of Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. In the event that his research does result in the development of a compound, he says, "if I need help in terms of synthesizing these drugs, or advice about recruiting certain people [to work on synthesis], Glaxo people could come to our labs to help out." A pharmaceutical firm has "better resources than many academic departments," says grant recipient Heidi Elizabeth Hamm of the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Medicine. "We can use all their drug design approaches - these are very expensive approaches." If the investigators' research leads to the development of a compound, she says, the researchers will have access to Glaxo's "incredible resources, [such as] nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. They [Glaxo] also have the ability to do fancy computer modeling." Although Glaxo announced the grantees by taking out full-page ads in scientific journals, the company will not reveal the nature of the funding recipients' research, or the amount given to each awardee. Making this information public, says Kirksey, would be "like revealing your R&D docket to potential competitors. If these projects were selected for funding, and we are funding them, that means they can point a direction for others, as well." Collaborations like this between a pharmaceutical firm and basic research scientists enable the investigators to "see the fruits of our work come to bear on therapeutics, and the quality of life," says grant recipient L. Bruce Pearce of Boston University School of Medicine. Ordinarily, he says, basic scientists "don't necessarily see the impact of [their] work in terms of medicine." Applications were reviewed by an advisory board that consisted of six scientists from around the country, some of whom were recommended by Glaxo's R&D staff and some by other board members. Raymond L. Woosley, chairman of pharmacology at Georgetown University School of Medicine and an advisory board member, says, "there were a ton of projects we would have liked to have funded" in addition to the 20 that were selected. The concept of "taking people who aren't in the drug-development business and giving them money to bring projects to fruition" is "a very innovative experiment," Woosley says. Even if the firm decides not to continue the program after these 20 three-year grants run out, "there'll be a lot of good research done." The investigators, he says, will "do a service to the medical community - I have no doubt about that. As for whether they'll yield some new drugs, only time will tell."

Glaxo Grant Program's Future Uncertain While Staff Assesses Grantees' Success

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