I talk about open science projects a lot, in particular ones that are aimed at the development of new medicines. A common question is "do companies contribute?"
The answer is yes. A lot. All the time.
This surprises many people, but shouldn't. I've written about this before, but wanted to flag it up again because contributions from companies happen all the time in open science projects.
I suspect this is well-known in software. Salaried company people giving time and expertise to open projects. The "Google 20%" - freedom to contribute to things that don't help the company's bottom line (and don't harm it, either). That's relevant, but not the whole story, since there are also huge open source projects that have stronger links to companies where the outputs help the company.
Over the last 15 years of doing open science medicinal chemistry projects, it's happened over and over and over and over. Small companies and big ones. Junior people and senior pharma professionals. Clear, public demonstrations of expertise by the company (that can lead to future investments - a successful funding round for Optibrium, for example, occurred after their successful participation in an Open Source Malaria competition). Good "unvarnished" PR. Fun and freedom for employees. Employee satisfaction at helping with something, e.g. in global health. Openness guaranteeing that the industry contribution makes a difference (i.e. it's needed), and does not disproportionately benefit a competitor. The Structural Genomics Consortium has seen the same thing over the years.
I'm mentioning this because it's just happened again. Some very excellent people at Hypha noticed that we wanted to identify a metabolite of one of the lead molecules in Open Source Antibiotics Series 2. We sent them the molecule with a very light touch MTA (it's all open, after all) and they did their wizardry (that we could not do) and sent us back a sample we were able to purify to prove the location of the oxidation. Fast, efficient, mutually beneficial collaboration, in the open. It was a pleasure working with them.
Naturally there needs to be a trusting relationship between company and project, though the openness helps with that. Often the productive relationship is between the people in the company and the project. Because it's open, there are often zero, or light touch, contractual obligations - this is both good (simple) and bad (can't require anyone to do anything). But it just seems to work so well, repeatedly, and works to everyone's advantage. And it emphasises the point that open science is far from being anti-pharma. Open science includes everyone.
It's be interesting to get a sense of examples of pharma/biotech companies officially allowing their employees to donate time to other projects, even if they are not open. I just saw this one re Charles River (screengrab below). Anyone know of others?
mattodd
commented
3 years ago 
I talk about open science projects a lot, in particular ones that are aimed at the development of new medicines. A common question is "do companies contribute?"
The answer is yes. A lot. All the time.
This surprises many people, but shouldn't. I've written about this before, but wanted to flag it up again because contributions from companies happen all the time in open science projects.
I suspect this is well-known in software. Salaried company people giving time and expertise to open projects. The "Google 20%" - freedom to contribute to things that don't help the company's bottom line (and don't harm it, either). That's relevant, but not the whole story, since there are also huge open source projects that have stronger links to companies where the outputs help the company.
We first demonstrated this in an experimental science project with the transformative impact on the discovery of a simple route to the active form of an important drug. Spontaneous, high quality inputs from companies (both ideas and lab work) in a basic science project towards an IP-free medicine that is now looking like it is going to impact a great many people.
Over the last 15 years of doing open science medicinal chemistry projects, it's happened over and over and over and over. Small companies and big ones. Junior people and senior pharma professionals. Clear, public demonstrations of expertise by the company (that can lead to future investments - a successful funding round for Optibrium, for example, occurred after their successful participation in an Open Source Malaria competition). Good "unvarnished" PR. Fun and freedom for employees. Employee satisfaction at helping with something, e.g. in global health. Openness guaranteeing that the industry contribution makes a difference (i.e. it's needed), and does not disproportionately benefit a competitor. The Structural Genomics Consortium has seen the same thing over the years.
I'm mentioning this because it's just happened again. Some very excellent people at Hypha noticed that we wanted to identify a metabolite of one of the lead molecules in Open Source Antibiotics Series 2. We sent them the molecule with a very light touch MTA (it's all open, after all) and they did their wizardry (that we could not do) and sent us back a sample we were able to purify to prove the location of the oxidation. Fast, efficient, mutually beneficial collaboration, in the open. It was a pleasure working with them.
Naturally there needs to be a trusting relationship between company and project, though the openness helps with that. Often the productive relationship is between the people in the company and the project. Because it's open, there are often zero, or light touch, contractual obligations - this is both good (simple) and bad (can't require anyone to do anything). But it just seems to work so well, repeatedly, and works to everyone's advantage. And it emphasises the point that open science is far from being anti-pharma. Open science includes everyone.