France's Servier inks deal with Ivy League university

France’s Servier has established a three-year strategic research alliance with Harvard University to support multiple, multi-year research projects that will focus on the development of innovative therapeutics across Servier’s areas of expertise.

The alliance represents a major milestone in non-profit foundation governed Servier’s ambition to build a footprint in the Boston and Cambridge research hub.

Under the new research alliance, coordinated by Harvard’s Office of Technology Development, Servier will support a number of faculty-initiated research projects at Harvard, identifying these projects through a request for proposals in two funding cycles. Harvard and Servier anticipate a range of projects spanning exploratory investigations of biological mechanisms, to identification of possible targets, or to preclinical validation of targets and leads.