Shionogi Co has selected Denmark as one of the countries in their Shionogi Science Program 2013. Shionogi Science Program invites researchers from selected countries outside Japan into joint studies. The aim is to invite novel, innovative and world-class ideas from researchers to create new pharmaceuticals. The program will adopt projects with budgets of JPY 5-15 million (approximately EUR 37.000-112.000) per year per project for up to 5 years.

Shionogi’s agreement with Denmark on international industry-academia collaboration was established last year and is a cornerstone in the efforts to further accelerate the globalization of the company’s activities. At that occasion Isao Teshirogi, CEO of Shionogi, explained why Denmark is ideal for a research-driven company like Shionogi:

“Denmark has the ‘Medicon Valley’, one of the famous bio clusters in Europe, and many bio-venture companies as well as academic institutions that actively promote research and development within life science and biotechnology. We are greatly honored to have an opportunity to form cooperative research relationships (…). We expect it to foster international human resources by interacting with researchers with cutting-edge knowledge. Taking advantage of this opportunity, we will accelerate our globalization based on research and development.”

Earlier this year Aalborg University’s pain research group was the first in Denmark selected to receive funding. Professor and director Lars Arendt-Nielsen at the Center for Sensory-Motor Interaction said:

“It is a great international recognition and seal of approval of our pain research, and the donation will support us in further intensifying the efforts to understand and measure pain and develop better treatment options for the millions of patients who suffer from chronic pain.”

Regional Project Manager at Invest in Denmark, Theresa Høgenhaug, says:

“My Japanese colleague in Tokyo and I have cooperated with Shionogi for several years, and they are impressed by the Danish research competences. This is the reason why they initially engaged in public-private cooperation and brought their Science Program to Denmark. The fact that Shionogi have already selected a Danish project and are currently inviting more Danish researchers to apply for next year’s funding shows that Danish research institutions indeed have a lot to offer.

The administrators of Shionogi Science Program visited Denmark last week and met with researchers from universities and hospitals – they clearly wish to establish close and long term relations with the research community in Denmark and wish to receive a large number of applications from Denmark this year.”

The application period runs until October 31.