Takeda partners with newly-formed Tri-1 TDI

The USA’s Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, The Rockefeller University and Weill Cornell Medical College have formed the pioneering Tri-Institutional Therapeutics Discovery Institute (Tri-I TDI) and have partnered with Takeda Pharmaceutical (TYO: 4502), Japan’s largest drug company.

This new, groundbreaking institute, designed to expedite early-stage drug discovery into innovative treatments and therapies for patients, was founded with a $15 million gift by Lewis and Ali Sanders and a $5 million gift from Howard and Abby Milstein.

The Tri-I TDI represents a novel partnership of academic institutions working together to more effectively develop therapeutics that arise from discoveries made in basic science labs. Its focus is on the early stages of developing compounds that make possible all-important “proof of concept” studies – those that increase the likelihood that targeting a specific biologic pathway can favorably alter the course of a disease.

Furthermore, the institute’s partnership with Takeda, a global research-based pharmaceutical company with a strong record of bringing new medicines to market, will benefit drug discovery work at all three institutions.