Oxford University, Apollo Therapeutics enter partnership for new drug development

The University of Oxford joins Apollo Therapeutics' other five top-class research institutes including Imperial College London, University College London, University of Cambridge, King’s College London and the Institute of Cancer Research.

The University of Oxford and Apollo Therapeutics have entered a drug discovery and development collaboration. Under this agreement, Apollo aims to translate the biomedical research at Oxford University into a drug. The biopharmaceutical company will identify and assess the validated research of the university that targets to become effective medicines and the university team will also be able to access programme funding and therapeutic development expertise from Apollo.

While commenting on the collaboration, Professor Chas Bountra, Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Innovation at the University of Oxford, said, "My amazing colleagues at Oxford have numerous cutting-edge research programmes for producing novel therapeutics for patients. Apollo Therapeutics has assembled a world-leading team of drug discovery and development experts. Together we are going to transform the lives of millions of patients. I am immensely excited about this collaboration."

Science and Technology Secretary, Peter Kyle, Department for Science, Innovation & Technology, said, "We want to harness life sciences to transform the UK’s healthcare and drive economic growth. Together, Apollo and Oxford University could deliver new medicines to help us tackle cancer, autoimmune disease, and more, improving and saving thousands of lives. The life sciences sector is open for business under this Government. We know that the best and boldest breakthroughs happen when industry and academia join forces, backed by government, and this partnership between Apollo and Oxford is proof of exactly what can be unlocked, when we open the doors to collaboration."

Oxford, Apollo Alliance: More Details

Through this partnership, the University of Oxford also joins Apollo’s other five world-class research institutions including Imperial College London, University College London, University of Cambridge, King’s College London and the Institute of Cancer Research.

Dr Mairi Gibbs, CEO of Oxford University Innovation, said: "We’re keen to provide our academic researchers with multiple avenues to realise the full potential of their cutting-edge research as quickly as possible. If we boost the funding and expertise provided to very early phase drug development programmes this will hasten their progress towards becoming medicines with the potential to licence to industry or become spinout companies. With the support of the research commercialisation team at Oxford University Innovation and our investment partners, we want to speed up the development of more life-saving medicines to help patients most in need."

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