Objective

The pharmaceutical industry is increasingly seeking solutions from the academic and SME sectors for major challenges to their business. Often these challenges relate to the use of animals, for example the problem of predicting clinical efficacy and safety from nonclinical studies. The UK National Centre for the Replacement, Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research (NC3Rs) has responded to this with the launch of CRACK IT, an open innovation platform which connects academia, industry and the SME sector in addressing scientific 'Challenges' which if solved will deliver 3Rs (replacement, reduction and refinement of animals in research) and commercial benefits, either by improving business processes or developing a commercialisable product. Through CRACK IT, we have awarded nearly £20M in research contracts to academic researchers and small companies to develop new research tools for companies including GlaxoSmithKline, AstraZeneca and Novartis. Here we will introduce the NC3Rs and showcase some of the outputs of the CRACK IT programme, highlighting opportunities for wider engagement of the ELRIG community.