GSK to set up L50M Chinese neuroscience center

In keeping with strategies discussed in its third-quarter financial update (Marketletter October 29), UK drug major GlaxoSmithKline is set to build a L50.0 million ($102.2 million) neuroscience research center in Shanghai, China. The news, which was reported by the Financial Times, forms part of R&D chief Moncef Slaoui's plans for a major shake up of the firm's drug development operations (see page 6). He told the FT that, "for us, China is not about outsourcing and cheap labor," adding that it is not the firm's intention to "give them the crumbs." Instead, he explained that the investment, one of the largest in the country by any of the drug majors, is designed to create "the next seedbed for future discoveries."