This is Capitalism. Let the government and educational institutions spend all of the money, do the real work and research, and then as a private company swoop in and reap all of the benefits.
A blatant example would be Gilead Truvada for PrEP. US Tax payer funded research and all profits go straight to Gilead.
A blatant example would be Gilead Truvada for PrEP. US Tax payer funded research and all profits go straight to Gilead.
That's such a gross oversimplification to the point it's just wrong. If you want to read how one of the two drugs in the combo was developed, I'd suggest this journal article [1] - I warn you, the story evolves over 15 years.
The initial discovery of the class of compounds was done at Emory university. Emory then partnered with Burroughs Wellcome. Burroughs Wellcome was then acquired by Glaxo, who halted the research. The rights then went back to Emory, who then spun it out to a start-up called Triangle Pharmaceuticals, who was then acquired by Gilead who brought Truvada to market.
Emory did sue a number of manufactures as they had a patent, but it was settled with a fat ($525M) cash payment to Emory and an on-going royalty stream.
At least in my understanding, the reason why governments have in interest in this kind of model is that companies in return provide employment and pay taxes (if you're lucky).
In the EU, there is a really strong focus these days on exploitation of the results that come out of the research projects they fund (Horizon 2020) that you sometimes almost feel a bit out of place as a researcher. As in: why should a researcher at a university care deeply about how their findings can be turned into products by some companies? I mean, not only are they usually not really qualified for such questions, but also if they were interested in product development, they'd probably work in industry (perhaps even for a higher salary).
A blatant example would be Gilead Truvada for PrEP. US Tax payer funded research and all profits go straight to Gilead.