Madrid, June 22nd 2015.- Today Madrid hosted a new session of the IMI-Info Day organized by the Spanish Technology Platform for Innovative Medicines, Farmaindustria, the Center for the Industrial and Technologic Development (CDTI), and Carlos III Health Institute in which some of the most appealing elements of the IMI2 5th call for proposals (soon to be launched) were presented.

Amelia Martín, Manager of the Spanish Technology Platform for Innovative Medicines, highlighted during the opening session that “the aim of this day is to inform companies and national centers about this public-private biomedical research, which is the most important in Europe and which has the highest budget allocated”.

In Martín’s words, “Spain needs to continue fostering biomedical public-private collaboration in order to attain a greater efficacy in the development of medicines to be safer and more effective”. In her opinion, “initiatives such as IMI and IMI-2 constitute a unique opportunity for companies and public centers to engage in this kind of collaborations”.

The Innovative Medicines Initiative IMI-2 was established in July 2014 under the New Horizon 2020 Framework. It gathers together collaboration activities between the European Commission and the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations (EFPIA), building on the success of its predecessor, IMI, aimed at fostering the development of new treatments, especially for those therapeutic areas where there remains unmet needs of those with a higher prevalence in society. In this occasion, IMI-2 fifth call relies on a budget of almost 92M€, aimed at encouraging projects in areas such as diabetes or neurodegenerative pathologies, focusing on Alzheimer`s disease.

One of the main novelties of IMI-2 is widening the range of stakeholders eligible for engaging in this initiative, turning other industrial sectors into strategic partners for this project. Thus, the IMI-2 Info Day in Madrid was opened to sectors such as healthcare devices, medical IT, diagnose devices or animal healthcare. “The Innovative Medicines Initiative intends to get the highest levels of efficiency onboard and therefore, it is strictly necessary to engage all those agents who are able to participate in any stage of the research and development processes of new treatments”, remarked Amelia Martín.

Since its implementation, the Innovative Medicines Initiative has proven to be an unprecedented success. The Head of the Spanish Technology Platform for Innovative Medicines assures that the 59 projects which are already being undertaken are proving to have a positive impact in the research and development of new treatments, while many of them are already producing very remarkable results.

Farmaindustria and the Spanish Technology Platform for Innovative Medicines are committed to the promotion and public advocacy of the Innovative Medicines Initiative since its beginning. The Association has always pursed to increase Spanish public and private participation in IMI consortia, given that engagement in these projects produces important returns for the country.