Partnership with University of Cambridge Focuses on Cardiovascular Disease

Pfizer is partnering with the Cardiovascular Epidemiology Unit (CEU) at the University of Cambridge in the U.K. to establish an embedded collaboration between Pfizer and the university. The objective? To combine population and laboratory science approaches to accelerate development of new medicines for cardiovascular disease.

The agreement with the University of Cambridge became effective late last year and the collaboration is directed under the joint leadership of Professor John Danesh of the University of Cambridge and Pfizer's Anders Malarstig, Director, Human Genetics in the PharmaTherapeutics Precision Medicine Group, who has been seconded to the university for a period of three years to explore ways in which Pfizer can leverage the advantages of such a world-class cardiovascular research unit.

"This is a win/win for Pfizer and the University of Cambridge," said Tim Rolph, Chief Scientific Officer, Cardiovascular, Metabolic and Endocrine Diseases. "Anders, who trained in genetic epidemiology and vascular biology at the Karolinska Institute, complements the existing quantitative strengths of the Cardiovascular Epidemiology Unit through his interests in disease mechanisms. And Pfizer benefits from the CEU's access to internationally outstanding data and sample resources and the expertise necessary to achieve our shared objectives."

The CEU's data and expertise includes population-based epidemiological studies with extensive lifestyle, biomarker, other phenotypic information, and stored DNA on more than 50,000 cardiovascular disease cases and 50,000 controls; access to recall-by-genotype and recall-by-phenotype resources; and expertise in therapeutics development.

"This collaboration with one of Europe's top academic departments of population health sciences furthers Pfizer's strategy to tap into some of the leading scientific minds and resources in academia," said Rod MacKenzie, Group Senior Vice President and Head of PharmaTherapeutics R&D. "This effort really highlights an important aspect of the 'new R&D' ecosystem that WRD is striving to create. Partnerships are at the heart of our strategy."

Danesh, Head of the Department of Public Health and Primary Care, agreed: "The Pfizer-Cambridge partnership represents an exciting model for collaborations between industry and academia."