The company has collaborated with the University of California, San Francisco marking the first collaboration in the entrepreneurial network of research partnerships.
Pfizer Worldwide Research & Development president Mikael Dolsten said the Centers represent a novel open innovation paradigm, combining the advantages of top academic research institutions with Pfizer’s drug development capabilities and research technologies.
As part of the initiative, Pfizer will establish local Centers at each partner site that enable the company and academic medical center teams to work together and Pfizer will also provide its proprietary antibody libraries and advanced research tools with technical support across the drug development process.
Pfizer will offer equitable intellectual property and ownership rights and broad rights to publication to its partners in addition to funding the pre-clinical and clinical trials.
The company will grant milestone payments and royalties related to the advancement of sponsored programs while it can strengthen its pipeline with candidate drugs.
The Centers will initially focus on partnerships within the US and expand to Asia and Europe in 2012.
Anthony Coyle will head Pfizer’s Global Centers for Therapeutic Innovation.