The Innovative Health Initiative (IHI) announces future call topics

The Innovative Health Initiative (IHI), a public-private partnership between the European Union and the European life science industries, published information on future calls ahead of publication end of July. 

Wim-Jan Koot explains: “Although IHI is a follow up of the Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI), there are important differences to be aware of when you participate in an IHI call. Most organisations that have worked with IMI in the past have experience with two-stage calls. In these calls, public consortia (excluding EFPIA) first had to submit their proposal for review by IMI. The public consortium with the highest ranked proposal would then have to team up with pre-identified EFPIA partners (private parties) to form the final consortium. In the second stage, this consortium would then have the opportunity to submit the full proposal.”

“As you will see, a number of the current IHI call topics are single stage calls, where both public and private parties have to form a consortium right from the start and jointly submit a proposal. For single stage calls, time and timing is even more important. At Lygature we see many organisations struggle with the idea of collaborating in single stage calls, where also the proposal writing and submission have to be completed in a joint effort.”

Lygature has experience in both type of calls and with complex multi stakeholder partnerships. Lygature acts as an independent partner to guide complex collaborations and provide much needed infrastructural components to create a consortium. Wim-Jan adds: “We notice that IHI puts much more time pressure to finalize the negotiation on legal agreements. This means a thorough preparation is extra important.”

Lygature is heavily involved in one of the first IHI projects that recently started: IDERHA. The newly formed IDERHA consortium addresses the obstacles in accessing, integrating and analysing health data to maximize their value for patient care and research. Lygature is proud to be one of 33 partners in IDERHA, being involved in program management, and co-leading the ethical and legal framework for data sharing, and co-leading communication, exploitation, and dissemination.

Wim-Jan concludes: “We notice that there are a number of IHI calls that focus on data infrastructure. In addition, showing true patient involvement is becoming an important prerequisite. At Lygature, we bring a lot of expertise in research consortia in both these areas, originating from our mission to accelerate the development of innovative solutions for better patient care. “

Are you interested to submit a proposal for one of the IHI calls and want to know how Lygature can support you? Have a look at our IHI page or contact Wim-Jan Koot for more information.