GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) has announced a funding injection of up to £5m from the Wellcome Trust to support its open approach to discover and develop the treatments for certain diseases.
The funding will move the early-stage research to the next level, to find new medicines for diseases such as TB, malaria, Leishmaniasis and sleeping sickness.
Scientists across the globe will work in collaboration with GSK drug discovery experts at its facility in Madrid, Spain.
The funding will provide the opportunity to progress on the projects by the scientists at open lab and from GSK's research portfolio.
Innovative research that has come about using the GSK malaria and TB compound collections, which have been made available and publically accessible by GSK also have the potential to benefit from the Wellcome Trust funding.
GSK Tres Cantos Medicines Development Campus head Nick Cammack said that the support highlights a growing recognition that collaborative and open research is the key to tackling these devastating diseases.
"Since adopting an open approach to discovering new medicines for developing world diseases, we've hosted some of the world's brightest academic scientists at Tres Cantos," Cammack added.
Wellcome Trust Business Development head Richard Seabrook said, "Academic researchers are making incredible progress in our understanding of neglected diseases yet we've still got a bottle neck when it comes to the development of new drugs."