1. What is IMI

• The Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI) is the world’s  largest biomedical/healthcare public-private initiative.
• It is a joint undertaking (JU) between the European Union and the pharmaceutical industry association EFPIA.
• IMI supports precompetitive collaborative research projects whose results will accelerate the development of better and safer medicines for patients and boost pharmaceutical innovation in Europe.
• Each IMI project is resourced through a cash contribution to Eligible Entities [1] and a matching in-kind contribution from the efforts of staff in EFPIA members’ own laboratories.
• The total budget for IMI is €2bn (€1bn cash from the European Commission and €1bn in-kind from EFPIA Participants).
• IMI is an experiment!  Never before has there been a public-private partnership of this size aiming to deliver research that is innovative, internationally leading, and improves drug development to get better medicines to patients faster.

[1] Eligible entities: Academia; Small-Medium Enterprises (SMEs) (EU definition); Patient organizations; Non-profit research organizations; Intergovernmental organizations