1 00:00:05,680 --> 00:00:12,520 We're drawn to the end of a great three days. I don't know about you, but my corner of the auditorium is getting a bit hot, so I hope you forgive me. 2 00:00:12,520 --> 00:00:16,840 Take my jacket off as before. I wish we could wander off the ball. 3 00:00:16,840 --> 00:00:22,390 But that's not possible. So I'd like to welcome back in person. 4 00:00:22,390 --> 00:00:28,000 Professor Charles Bouncier CBE, the Centre for Innovation here at Oxford. 5 00:00:28,000 --> 00:00:32,860 Who's going to wrap up the conference for us? Thank you very much off your chest. 6 00:00:32,860 --> 00:00:39,730 Well, colleagues, thank you very much and thank you fell. Please don't take any more clothes off, Phil. 7 00:00:39,730 --> 00:00:45,040 But many, many thanks to all of you. I mean, this has really been wonderful. 8 00:00:45,040 --> 00:00:49,540 I've very much enjoyed Nick and Brian's presentations on Wednesday. 9 00:00:49,540 --> 00:00:56,380 And Phil, thanks for sort of sharing that. And then, of course, autoline and massive day yesterday with Joe sharing. 10 00:00:56,380 --> 00:01:00,310 And Robin Jarod's as presentations today, I thought were awesome. 11 00:01:00,310 --> 00:01:04,720 And Thomas, thanks for doing all of that. I have to say I thought. 12 00:01:04,720 --> 00:01:09,580 I'd love to see some of those slides, I don't know if the slides are going to be made available, 13 00:01:09,580 --> 00:01:13,850 I'd love to look at them and sort of reflect on them a little bit more on my own, 14 00:01:13,850 --> 00:01:17,710 actually, but many thanks to all of the speakers and the chairs, 15 00:01:17,710 --> 00:01:23,740 and thanks to all of you for sort of spending time with us and all the organisers and the backstage team. 16 00:01:23,740 --> 00:01:30,070 It's an amazing job. I mean, we've talked a lot about how could we speed things up? 17 00:01:30,070 --> 00:01:35,240 How can we encourage more international collaboration? How can we focus on big problems? 18 00:01:35,240 --> 00:01:42,850 So what I'll do is I'll just share with you a few reflections and maybe touch on a few things that maybe haven't been given so much emphasis, 19 00:01:42,850 --> 00:01:47,120 maybe this afternoon. I think we're all agreed that. 20 00:01:47,120 --> 00:01:58,340 We have to work together to create solutions to some of the biggest problems facing us, and we need to do that quickly with a real sense of urgency. 21 00:01:58,340 --> 00:02:03,020 So I'll maybe make four points. One is around pooling. 22 00:02:03,020 --> 00:02:07,490 Secondly around prioritising. Thirdly, around people. 23 00:02:07,490 --> 00:02:16,760 And fourthly, around culture. So pooling, first of all, we absolutely have to pool our resources wherever we can. 24 00:02:16,760 --> 00:02:23,450 Our infrastructure is our expertise because there is no one university or no 25 00:02:23,450 --> 00:02:29,120 one company or no one country that can tackle these problems on their own. 26 00:02:29,120 --> 00:02:36,860 We have to work together. I mean, I talked earlier about sort of the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine. 27 00:02:36,860 --> 00:02:45,440 I mean, that vaccine would not have gone into the arms of people if the university tried to do it on their own. 28 00:02:45,440 --> 00:02:56,510 You know, it was successful because we worked with we access expertise and resources that we didn't have, but that existed inside AstraZeneca. 29 00:02:56,510 --> 00:03:01,340 We worked with colleagues in government and funders and regulators, et cetera. 30 00:03:01,340 --> 00:03:04,850 And that's why it's been such an amazing success. 31 00:03:04,850 --> 00:03:11,100 I think related to that, I would say, I mean, we all like to talk about our strengths, and that's fantastic. 32 00:03:11,100 --> 00:03:16,850 Of course, we like to build on our strengths. But I think we have to be honest about our weaknesses, 33 00:03:16,850 --> 00:03:21,560 and we need to identify partners who can help fill those gaps and so that we 34 00:03:21,560 --> 00:03:27,920 can create complementary partnerships that we can create Win-Win solutions. 35 00:03:27,920 --> 00:03:34,610 The second comments around prioritising, you know, there are so many problems facing us. 36 00:03:34,610 --> 00:03:38,360 I mean, in the space I work in, in sort of health care, 37 00:03:38,360 --> 00:03:49,040 I could rattle off about mental health or dementia or rare disease or cancer or diabetes or AMR or pandemics or whatever. 38 00:03:49,040 --> 00:03:57,260 But. And then you've got climate change. And you know, there you're talking about pollution, energy, water, food. 39 00:03:57,260 --> 00:04:08,300 And you know, as Malcolm kept emphasising this afternoon, the climate health problem is ten times the size, maybe even bigger than the problem. 40 00:04:08,300 --> 00:04:13,700 We've been dealing with their own sort of dementia or mental health or whatever, et cetera. 41 00:04:13,700 --> 00:04:18,110 But there are so many problems, and the fact is no funding. 42 00:04:18,110 --> 00:04:23,840 No government has got enough money to do it on their own, and we have to prioritise. 43 00:04:23,840 --> 00:04:26,130 We have to focus. 44 00:04:26,130 --> 00:04:35,040 And I think each of these problems are not going to get solved by putting five million or 10 million, even a few hundred million isn't going to do it. 45 00:04:35,040 --> 00:04:41,010 Many of these problems are going to require billions of pounds and tens of billions of pounds. 46 00:04:41,010 --> 00:04:49,530 I mean, the vaccine, I don't know how many low billions AstraZeneca will have invested in that vaccine. 47 00:04:49,530 --> 00:04:55,830 It's not hundreds of millions, it's billions. So we need that scale of funding. 48 00:04:55,830 --> 00:04:57,570 And of course, you know, 49 00:04:57,570 --> 00:05:07,170 you could argue that the reason the world was successful last year in developing a number of vaccines was partly because funding was not limiting. 50 00:05:07,170 --> 00:05:14,460 You know, governments, funders, philanthropists, everybody was throwing money at the COVID 19 vaccine problem. 51 00:05:14,460 --> 00:05:17,460 And it was interesting. Middle of last year, 52 00:05:17,460 --> 00:05:25,530 many leading scientists thought that what they were worried we wouldn't get a vaccine to COVID because we don't have a vaccine for HIV. 53 00:05:25,530 --> 00:05:29,790 The fortunate lead turned out at the end of the year. We've got quite a few of them. 54 00:05:29,790 --> 00:05:37,530 And it's worth saying that sort of, you know, AML or anti-microbial resistance or dementia. 55 00:05:37,530 --> 00:05:42,300 You know, Saudi Davies has been talking about AML for a decade. 56 00:05:42,300 --> 00:05:45,810 Jim O'Neill did that big report three or four years ago. 57 00:05:45,810 --> 00:05:55,410 Dementia, you know, collectively across the world, we've we've been spending tens of billions and we don't have treatments for these. 58 00:05:55,410 --> 00:06:02,130 I'm not convinced that the reason Biogen approved drug is effective, but the jury's out. 59 00:06:02,130 --> 00:06:08,400 I hope it will be. But we don't have drugs at the moment to slow down the progression of Alzheimer's. 60 00:06:08,400 --> 00:06:12,330 So it's it's not always about just throwing money at it. 61 00:06:12,330 --> 00:06:18,810 I think we have to be joined up and we have to minimise duplication and monama the great 62 00:06:18,810 --> 00:06:24,060 points in a discussion I was in this afternoon that I think often funding is reactive. 63 00:06:24,060 --> 00:06:28,230 And of course, it certainly was with COVID, it was reactive and it would. 64 00:06:28,230 --> 00:06:33,480 I think if we put that sort of scale of funding into EMR, we would have sorted it out by now. 65 00:06:33,480 --> 00:06:42,690 So I think it's also worth saying that funders can accelerate innovation and impact. 66 00:06:42,690 --> 00:06:47,730 And you know, we academics will go where the money is. 67 00:06:47,730 --> 00:06:51,960 And so I think it is possible for the funders to influence. 68 00:06:51,960 --> 00:06:57,980 But one example I'd like to share, maybe just for all of you to reflect on. 69 00:06:57,980 --> 00:07:04,340 This is a project I think David Cameron started, this was the Dementia Discovery Fund four or five years ago, 70 00:07:04,340 --> 00:07:09,230 managed now by Kate Fingar that basically that the UK government put some money in. 71 00:07:09,230 --> 00:07:10,820 This was for Alzheimer's. 72 00:07:10,820 --> 00:07:19,520 Obviously, the UK government put some money in Alzheimer's Society, Alzheimer's Research UK and then I think five or six farmers. 73 00:07:19,520 --> 00:07:24,080 They created an aggregate pulse of about 100 million, just over 100 million. 74 00:07:24,080 --> 00:07:32,360 And it was to focus on creating new companies devoted to sort of coming up with new targets for Alzheimer's, et cetera. 75 00:07:32,360 --> 00:07:36,800 Now, Kate, with our amazing leadership, has grown that partner to, I think, 76 00:07:36,800 --> 00:07:47,450 250 million with some pension money from the U.S. Gates Foundation and maybe some other farmers, etc. I think that's been a great success. 77 00:07:47,450 --> 00:07:54,890 It's got government charities, industry working together with lots of academic groups all over the world, 78 00:07:54,890 --> 00:07:58,760 got pension funds involved, gates involved, et cetera. 79 00:07:58,760 --> 00:08:07,460 And I think it was a genius move to have an investor like Kate Bingham, A.D. Life Sciences, managing it. 80 00:08:07,460 --> 00:08:15,590 And I think, of course, these investors are very much focussed on an output, very much focussed in terms of milestones, et cetera, et cetera. 81 00:08:15,590 --> 00:08:20,330 So I think that's a good model. I think maybe we should do that in other areas. 82 00:08:20,330 --> 00:08:23,610 The third thing I'd like to say is around people. 83 00:08:23,610 --> 00:08:31,230 I hope I don't offend people then sort of, you know, to to tackle some of these problems, we need great leaders. 84 00:08:31,230 --> 00:08:42,810 We need great innovators and we need great entrepreneurs. And I absolutely believe that all researchers or in fact, few researchers are leaders. 85 00:08:42,810 --> 00:08:49,080 Few researchers are innovators and few researchers are entrepreneurs. 86 00:08:49,080 --> 00:08:55,530 And it's these people we need because these are the individuals that really make things happen. 87 00:08:55,530 --> 00:09:01,800 They develop new technologies and processes. They will not take no for an answer. 88 00:09:01,800 --> 00:09:07,260 They harness resources and expertise. They create that single vision. 89 00:09:07,260 --> 00:09:12,000 They're flexible. They're agile. They're creative. They have a sense of urgency. 90 00:09:12,000 --> 00:09:18,960 They inspire people. They bring people along, etc. That's what we need to tackle these big problems. 91 00:09:18,960 --> 00:09:27,080 The full thing about culture. I think we should applaud great people and great companies. 92 00:09:27,080 --> 00:09:33,380 So let me just give you an example. I mean, Pascal Soriot, the CEO of AstraZeneca, 93 00:09:33,380 --> 00:09:42,590 I think what he did was a very brave thing last year to say that he's going to work with the University of Oxford to produce a vaccine for the world, 94 00:09:42,590 --> 00:09:47,300 and he's going to distribute that vaccine three billion samples at cost. 95 00:09:47,300 --> 00:09:55,160 So AstraZeneca is not going to make any profit out of it. Now, of course, you know, they are talking about a global pharma company. 96 00:09:55,160 --> 00:10:03,200 Other companies today are making tens of billions to their vaccines, and AstraZeneca are not. 97 00:10:03,200 --> 00:10:08,960 I think we need to applaud people like Pascal and companies like A-Z. 98 00:10:08,960 --> 00:10:15,800 And I think what they've done is amazing. And frankly, I think Pascal deserves a Nobel prise. 99 00:10:15,800 --> 00:10:22,100 The second thing around culture is I think we need to help and support each other. 100 00:10:22,100 --> 00:10:26,540 And I think we've talked about it collaborating and not competing. 101 00:10:26,540 --> 00:10:35,630 Now, of course, that's not I mean, it's it's hard if you're working in a company, I think I think last year is towards us. 102 00:10:35,630 --> 00:10:40,460 Even countries compete, unfortunately, and we need to sort that out. 103 00:10:40,460 --> 00:10:47,000 But I think in universities, we should be able to collaborate more easily and they should be less competition. 104 00:10:47,000 --> 00:10:55,530 And Alice Frost, who is chairing a wonderful session yesterday that I was in when she started this thing, called the Connecting Capability Fund. 105 00:10:55,530 --> 00:11:02,360 It's about three years ago, which is very much about trying to get universities to work together, to work with industry, 106 00:11:02,360 --> 00:11:10,160 to work with funders, to work with patient groups, et cetera, et cetera, to try and create impact through knowledge exchange. 107 00:11:10,160 --> 00:11:12,410 I think that's been an awesome project. 108 00:11:12,410 --> 00:11:19,730 But even there, I mean, I've noticed that there's still this tendency for universities to compete with each other. 109 00:11:19,730 --> 00:11:24,320 I thought Rob's presentation this afternoon, I thought, was absolutely awesome. 110 00:11:24,320 --> 00:11:27,110 Rob, I'd love to come and visit your institute. 111 00:11:27,110 --> 00:11:36,680 I mean, I love the comments about breaking down silos and having people who are comfortable working in an academic and an industrial environment. 112 00:11:36,680 --> 00:11:43,590 The only one slight thing, I think I slightly. I'm not saying I disagree with Rob on, but I need to reflect on it. 113 00:11:43,590 --> 00:11:49,520 I mean, Rob was very much focussed on objectives and wanted to do away with milestones and deliverables. 114 00:11:49,520 --> 00:11:53,330 I certainly think we need milestones so that we can sort of track progress. 115 00:11:53,330 --> 00:12:00,950 So just a few reflections. I think it's largely just reiterating what some colleagues have already said. 116 00:12:00,950 --> 00:12:09,680 But Autoline, I thought, you know, yesterday in one of the slides I see, she put in a very much focus around people, 117 00:12:09,680 --> 00:12:17,510 around ideas, around infrastructures, around connectivity and targeting. 118 00:12:17,510 --> 00:12:23,360 And I think I've probably said those five things using my own words. 119 00:12:23,360 --> 00:12:27,380 So, Autoline, thanks for that presentation. 120 00:12:27,380 --> 00:12:34,620 Yesterday was superb. Just to finish off. I mean, Malcolm Scheindlin and I used to work with a. 121 00:12:34,620 --> 00:12:40,320 Great individual named Tashi Ahmad, I think he's one of the greatest scientific leaders I've met. 122 00:12:40,320 --> 00:12:45,500 And he always used to say. Patients are waiting. 123 00:12:45,500 --> 00:12:52,220 And and of course, that's working inside a pharmaceutical company, so that makes eminent sense. 124 00:12:52,220 --> 00:13:02,630 But I think today, I think we all recognise that, you know, there are sort of health challenges that we all have societies all over the world. 125 00:13:02,630 --> 00:13:12,710 But climate health. Is a massive problem, if climate health fails, then all of us have finished, 126 00:13:12,710 --> 00:13:23,030 and so maybe I would just change tack Xi's comments instead of patients awaiting, I would say, patients and future generations awaiting that. 127 00:13:23,030 --> 00:13:29,930 I think they are looking to us to work together to come up with solutions to some of these problems. 128 00:13:29,930 --> 00:13:40,250 So on that note, thank you very much. And I should just remind you all Phil has promised you all a drink next year, so please hold him to it. 129 00:13:40,250 --> 00:13:46,760 So thank you and all the very best to. Thank you, Charles. 130 00:13:46,760 --> 00:13:56,608 Future generations are waiting, I think that's that's a great note to leave on.