Tender for the Appointment of a Fund Investment Adviser

An estimated 44 million people currently live with dementia around the world and this figure is set to triple by 2030. There has been little success to date in finding a cure or a disease modifying treatment for dementia: only 3 new drugs have entered the market in the past 15 years. On 11th December 2013, the UK hosted a G7 summit on dementia in London where G7 members committed to identify a cure or a disease-modifying therapy for dementia by 2025 and to increase collectively and significantly the amount of funding for dementia research. The World Dementia Council (“WDC”) has been taking this commitment forward, particularly focusing on integrated development and data sharing across research organisations, as well as on ways to increase funding for dementia research. The UK Government has played a leading role in this work and on 5th December 2014, as part of the Autumn Statement, the Chancellor announced that the UK Government will be investing £15m into new and pioneering areas of research into dementia. 1 It is proposed that this investment will be through an investment fund focused on pre-clinical research in dementia (the “Fund”). To support the establishment of the Fund, the Department of Health (“DH”) is launching an open tender to identify an organisation that will act as the investment adviser to the Fund (the “Investment Adviser”).