Partnership with Tsinghua University

INCREASE and Tsinghua University signed a Memorandum of Understanding on June 26th, 2024, at a ceremony in Jakarta, Indonesia, formalizing a bilateral collaboration to enhance clinical research and laboratory testing capabilities in Indonesia with a particular focus on vaccine development and genomic medicine.

Tsinghua University, one of Asia's leading research universities, brings world-class expertise in life sciences, genomics, and translational medicine. Its School of Life Sciences and the Tsinghua-Peking Center for Life Sciences have published extensively in high-impact journals and maintain deep partnerships with pharmaceutical companies and health agencies globally.

For INCREASE, the partnership represents a significant step in fulfilling its mission to integrate global scientific standards into local clinical practice. INCREASE's central reference laboratory and site network provide the translational bridge needed to validate research findings in real-world clinical settings across Indonesia's diverse population.

The collaboration will prioritize two major workstreams. The first is vaccine clinical research, where Tsinghua's immunology and vaccinology research groups will collaborate with INCREASE's CRO operations to design and execute Phase I and II clinical trials for novel vaccine candidates in Indonesia. The second workstream focuses on genomics and precision medicine, leveraging Tsinghua's genomics infrastructure and INCREASE's biobanking capabilities to generate population-level genomic data relevant to Southeast Asian health conditions.

Indonesia's large and genetically diverse population makes it an invaluable resource for genomic research, yet it has historically been underrepresented in global genomic databases. This collaboration aims to address that gap by generating high-quality, ethically sourced genomic data from Indonesian participants enrolled in clinical studies.

Dr. Robby Hertanto, CEO of INCREASE, commented: 'Partnering with an institution of Tsinghua University's calibre elevates our ability to contribute to global science. We look forward to building a pipeline of research that positions Indonesia as a recognized source of scientific insight in vaccines and genomics.'

Initial collaborative projects are expected to be announced in late 2024, with the full research program scaling over a three-year horizon. Both institutions have committed to pursuing joint grant applications under international frameworks including the ASEAN Science and Technology Fund and bilateral Indonesia-China research programs.