WHO WE ARE

We are a community and a movement. We come from across continents, stages of the drug discovery process, and fields. We hail from the worlds of informatics, business, open source theory, activism, law, art, media, rare and neglected disease, radical pharma innovation, small and big pharma, government, universities, patient communities, NGOs, and multilaterals. Open source brings the promise of efficient, robust and inclusive routes to drug discovery. Using computing, crowdsourcing, big data, data transparency, and open IP, OSP is an alternate paradigm for pharmaceutical innovation. It is a glimpse of the future. We build on a long history of inquiry, research, meetings, and publications on open source principles as applied to the pharmaceutical industry. Following much prior work, a group of 23 people met at the Rockefeller Foundation Centre in Bellagio, Italy in 2014 and unanimously created a mission and set of operating principles as described below.

WHAT WE DO

• Nurture the growing open source community in the pharma industry and related sectors
• ​Enable the exchange of information on open source pharma-related topics
• Encourage and advocate for the development of affordable new therapies via open source principles
• ​Develop open source licences and other incentive structures
• ​Form scientific and other partnerships to drive open source drug discovery​ in areas of great health need

OUR VISION & MISSION STATEMENT

VISION
Medicine for all.

MISSION
Create a movement that includes existing initiatives and develops an alternative, comprehensive, open source pharmaceutical system driven by principles of openness, patient needs, and affordability.

OPERATING PRINCIPLES

1. Employ radical openness, sharing, and transparency.
2. Leverage the global brainpower of the crowd.
3. Adopt open and innovative approaches to the management of intellectual property and financing.
4. Create monetary and nonmonetary reward systems for R&D that are alternatives to the prevailing proprietary model.
5. Support open access to papers, data, and other research outputs.
6. Convene and mobilise thought, opinion, and community leadership in reshaping R&D.
7. Combine small, nimble, cost-effective facilitating structures able to harness the power of individuals and entities.
8. Deliver affordable products.
9. Place patients and their interests at the center of the R&D model and the pharmaceutical system.
10. Develop a portfolio focused on critical gaps in global health where traditional market approaches are failing, e.g., anti-infectives.​

Signatories