| Administrative History | The Therapeutic Research Corporation of Great Britain, Limited (TRC) was incorporated on 12 November, 1941 and formed a limited group of leading fine chemical and pharmaceutical manufacturers. At its incorporation TRC comprised five member-companies with directors from each including John Boot, of Boots Pure Drug Company, Ltd., Mr. C. A. Hill, of the British Drug Houses, Ltd., Mr. H. Jephcott, of Glaxo Laboratories, Ltd., Mr. T. B. Maxwell, of May and Baker, Ltd., and Mr. T. R. G. Bennett, of the Wellcome Foundation, Ltd. The TRC was a solution to the pharmaceutical’s perceived problem of under-investment in research capacity. It succeeded in changing the competitive character of innovation in pharmaceuticals, and an attitude toward increasing shared strategies in the industry by coordinating research.
The fundamental purpose of TRC, as described in the 1941 Memorandum, was 'the integration and ultimate development of large-scale research', by pooling research and manufacturing industries, and making available the mechanism to present resulting work to Government departments, and medical professionals. A key area of research concerned the industrial production of penicillin during World War Two.
The TRC went on to fund a number of research groups at various academic institutions in the UK, bringing together academic scientific researchers from the university sector and research scientists from private industry. Collaboration was later extended to include The Imperial Chemical (Pharmaceuticals) Ltd and some USA companies, including Pfizer and Merck with an interchange of information from 1942 onwards. The success of the TRC was announced in a press release in 1945 ‘Of the total quantity of penicillin manufactured in Great Britain during 1944, so 90 per cent was manufactured in the plants operated by member-companies… using processes resulting from collaborative research carried out through the corporation’. |