Bridging the financial gap through providing contract services: a model for publicly funded clinical biobanks

Biobanks offer translational researchers a novel method of obtaining clinical research materials, patient data, and relevant ethical and legal permissions. However, such tissue collections are expensive to establish and maintain. Current opinion is that such initiatives can only survive with core funding from Government or major funding bodies. Given the present climate of financial austerity, funding agencies may be tempted to invest in fast-return research projects rather than in maintaining tissue collections, whose benefits will only become apparent in much longer timescales. Thus, securing additional funding for biobanks could provide a valuable boost enabling an extension of core services. Here we suggest that using biobank expertise to offer contract services to clinicians and industry may be an alternative approach to obtaining such extra funding.