IQVIA Joins UK Government Collaboration to Provide Single Research Platform to Speed Development of New COVID-19 Treatments

IQVIA™ (NYSE:IQV), a leading global provider of advanced analytics, technology solutions and contract research services to the life sciences industry, has joined the ACCORD-2 collaboration, which will fast-track development of new treatments for COVID-19. IQVIA will provide a single research platform across the United Kingdom to facilitate multiple clinical trials regardless of sponsor. This strategic alliance will examine the effectiveness of repurposed medicines, potential new drugs, and unlicensed therapies for treating COVID-19 patients.

ACCORD-2 (ACcelerating COVID-19 Research & Development) brings together the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), 10 of its Biomedical Research Centres led by Southampton Biomedical Research Centre, UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) and industry partners. The ACCORD-2 initiative has received regulatory approval and will immediately begin enrollment of COVID-19 patients into trials to allow urgent access to potential treatments.

The ACCORD-2 collaboration’s accelerated approval process will ensure that patients in significant need receive potentially groundbreaking treatment as trial compounds are delivered to the National Health Service in the coming days and weeks.

The typical study design phase usually takes up to 18 months, but due to the collaborative nature of this agreement among NIHR, UKRI and IQVIA’s partner hospitals, human trials could be possible in several weeks with a goal of compressing that timeline even further.

Drug compounds that demonstrate effectiveness and safety in the early clinical trials stage will then be moved rapidly onto large-scale research platforms, such as the Randomised Evaluation of COVID Therapy (RECOVERY) trial or other standalone IQVIA studies. BerGenBio will provide the first treatment for the study.

IQVIA will quickly recruit patients for the ACCORD-2 studies and will use a range of proprietary technological solutions wherever feasible to minimize infection risk to researchers and to reduce the administrative burden on hard-pressed hospitals.

Members of the comprehensive ACCORD-2 collaboration will make their data and findings available on an open-source basis to enable global information sharing and encourage further collaboration in near real time.

Speaking about IQVIA’s involvement in the ACCORD-2 Collaboration, U.K. General Manager and Senior Vice President for Northern Europe Tim Sheppard said:

"COVID-19 is the greatest public health challenge that has faced the world in a generation. We at IQVIA are proud to be able to use our technology platform, vast network of clinical trial infrastructure and research experience to work with partners developing treatments that could positively alter the course of this pandemic.

"Together with the NIHR, UKRI and Southampton, IQVIA will provide the necessary clinical research capabilities, scientific expertise, innovative technologies, advanced data analytics and drug assessment resources through our team, which includes thousands of U.K.-based clinicians, PhDs, epidemiologists and statisticians. Through this collaboration, we will explore whether treatments already in the research pipeline for other conditions or new compounds that come forward could be instrumental to saving lives.”

Richard Godfrey, chief executive officer of BerGenBio, said:

"We are delighted to be part of this initiative, which is a groundbreaking partnership between government, academia and industry. We are hopeful that our bemcentinib selective AXL inhibitor can play a significant role in the global effort to find suitable treatment options for patients with COVID-19, which has had such serious implications for so many people, and thereby ease pressures on hospital intensive care units and ultimately treat thousands of patients. We are poised to begin dosing in the coming days and will provide results as soon as is practically possible.”

About IQVIA

IQVIA (NYSE:IQV) is a leading global provider of advanced analytics, technology solutions and contract research services to the life sciences industry. Formed through the merger of IMS Health and Quintiles, IQVIA applies human data science — leveraging the analytic rigor and clarity of data science to the ever-expanding scope of human science — to enable companies to reimagine and develop new approaches to clinical development and commercialization, speed innovation and accelerate improvements in healthcare outcomes. Powered by the IQVIA CORE™, IQVIA delivers unique and actionable insights at the intersection of large-scale analytics, transformative technology and extensive domain expertise, as well as execution capabilities. With approximately 67,000 employees, IQVIA conducts operations in more than 100 countries.

IQVIA is a global leader in protecting individual patient privacy. The company uses a wide variety of privacy-enhancing technologies and safeguards to protect individual privacy while generating and analyzing information on a scale that helps healthcare stakeholders identify disease patterns and correlate with the precise treatment path and therapy needed for better outcomes. IQVIA’s insights and execution capabilities help biotech, medical device and pharmaceutical companies, medical researchers, government agencies, payers and other healthcare stakeholders tap into a deeper understanding of diseases, human behaviors and scientific advances, in an effort to advance their path toward cures. To learn more, visit www.iqvia.com.

Click here to subscribe to Mobile Alerts for IQVIA.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200429005463/en/