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Deliver more products of value

Our plans

Focus on the best science

Around 75 per cent of assets in our pipeline are entirely new compounds or vaccines, demonstrating our strong drive towards innovation.

During the year we rebalanced our Drug Discovery organisation to improve efficiency and focus on the areas of new science that we believe are most likely to lead to new medicines. Together with vaccines, GSK’s R&D is now focused on eight therapy areas: Biopharmaceuticals, Immuno-Inflammation, Infectious diseases, Metabolic pathways, Neuroscience, Oncology, Ophthalmology and Respiratory.

Diversify through externalisation

We recognise that we do not have a monopoly on the best science. Therefore we have proactively expanded collaborations with external partners as well as with academia to access innovation and strengthen our early pipeline.
 
Recent alliances with organisations such as Cellzome and the Harvard Stem Cell Institute and acquisitions such as that of Sirtris and Genelabs are providing us with competitive advantage in important areas of research.

In the last year, we completed or expanded 21 new drug discovery alliances adding significant breadth and scale to our R&D activities. There are currently 70 discovery units working either inside the company or externally.

Biopharmaceuticals will play an increasingly important role in our future portfolio. Offering a worldwide market of approximately £40 billion projected with compound annual growth of 18 per cent over the next five years, biopharmaceuticals are compounds capable of being manufactured by living organisms, usually cultured cells.

Currently only six per cent of our pipeline comprises biopharmaceuticals, which is below the industry average. We have significantly expanded our biopharmaceutical pipeline through in-house discovery, the acquisition of Domantis and by in-licensing late-stage products. There are currently 10 clinical research programmes underway including five assets in late-stage development.

Re-personalise R&D

We want to create an environment where there is no impediment to our best scientists making the kind of discoveries which will transform the company’s future by delivering value to patients, healthcare providers and shareholders. 

2008 saw the creation of Discovery Performance Units (DPUs) within our Centres of Excellence for Drug Discovery (CEDDs). Each DPU is a compact, fully-empowered, focused and integrated team which has responsibility for a small part of the pipeline.

We have also created new, integrated R&D Units for Biopharmaceuticals and Oncology. The R&D centre we established in China in 2007 is now 200 people strong and has recruited experienced scientists who are dedicated solely to GSK’s neurodegenerative research.

Focus on return on investment

We have adopted a more disciplined approach to how and where we allocate resources within R&D. More than 35% of discovery projects have been terminated following our therapy area rebalancing exercise and reviews by the new Drug Discovery Investment Board.

As part of the same process, all our 35 Discovery Performance Units now have three year funding in place to develop their projects.

We realise that reimbursement is the key to long-term financial performance and we are working hard to bring a health outcome focus to R&D which will in turn deliver greater value to healthcare providers. For example, in Europe direct dialogue now exists between payer organisations and our R&D teams to improve our understanding of the perceived benefit and value of new products.