Singapore - Asia Pacific specialist CRO Novotech announced that it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with South Korea's SCI-Consortium of Clinical Trial Centers and its representative hospital, Severance Hospital, Yonsei University Health System.

The SCI-Consortium (SCIC) is a network of clinical trial centers comprising four of South Korea's leading hospitals: Yonsei University Health System (Severance Hospital and Gangnam Severance Hospital), The Catholic University of Korea St Mary's Hospital and Inha University Hospital.

The network provides clinical trial access to over 1,500 investigators, almost 6,000 hospital beds and more than seven million patients per year. One of the SCIC's key strengths is its clinical trial data system with more than ten million de-identified records. Its vast database provides easy identification of potential eligible patients, allowing much faster clinical trial recruitment. At present, the SCIC has over 30,000 active patients enrolled in clinical studies.

Under the terms of the MOU, Severance Hospital as representative of SCIC will provide professional and medical advice to Novotech for clinical trials conducted at the four hospitals; including feasibility, principal investigator selection and assistance with patient recruitment. Novotech will assist in promoting the clinical research capabilities of the SCIC internationally. Both parties have agreed to continue expanding the future scope of the collaboration.

"Greater Seoul is the second largest metropolitan city in the world with almost 26 million people. This sheer scale of the hospitals, quality of the infrastructure and technology and concentration of key opinion leaders has created one of the world's most impressive clinical trial destinations," said Novotech CEO Dr. John Moller, "We are continually impressed with the efficiency of the regulatory system and quality of support provided by South Korea's clinical trial institutions. Our MOU with SCIC is another strong example of our commitment to undertaking clinical trials in South Korea."