Areas of interest

Explore Bristol Myers Squibb's areas of interest and research priorities, highlighting opportunities for collaboration and innovation across therapeutic areas and scientific disciplines.

Bristol Myers Squibb is focused on discovering, developing and delivering innovative medicines that help patients prevail over serious diseases.

External innovation and partnering are critical drivers of our strategy.

We seek collaborations in our core therapeutic areas and pursue differentiated platforms. 

We focus on breakthrough science that has the potential to be first- or best-in-class and address areas of high unmet medical need.

Therapeutic areas

Watch this video to hear from R&D Leaders on our solid tumors areas of interest

Bristol Myers Squibb has pioneered breakthrough medicines that have changed survival expectations for patients with cancer. From the early breakthroughs such as taxane-based chemotherapy to transforming the treatment landscape by harnessing the body’s immune system to fight cancer, we have created an extensive portfolio of investigational therapeutics and approved medicines.

  • We leverage our expertise in foundational cancer biology and application of translational approaches to benefit patients across all stages of disease
  • We are pursuing bold, novel therapies that focus on disease biology of cancers with high unmet need
  • Our diverse and broad toolbox of modalities allows us to match the right therapeutic modality to a molecular mechanism of action 
  • We are investigating tumor intrinsic and extrinsic pathways, including factors within the immune system, to enable novel cancer therapies

Areas of interest include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • Emerging modalities, such as radiopharmaceuticals, immune cell engagers
  • Continued investment in targeted protein degrader platform
  • Leveraging cell surface vulnerabilities with modalities including antibody drug conjugates
  • Tumor intrinsic biology with clear patient selection strategy
  • Historically intractable targets to develop disruptive and innovative therapeutics
  • Novel innate and adaptive immune mechanisms
  • Next-generation therapies with differentiated safety and efficacy profiles
  • Therapies that address tumor intrinsic vulnerabilities and primary or acquired mechanisms of resistance to standard of care

Learn more about solid tumor compounds in pipeline.

Cross-therapeutic areas of focus

Translational Medicine

At Bristol Myers Squibb, hundreds of world-class researchers make up the translational medicine team, spanning all therapeutic areas of focus from early discovery to commercialization. Leveraging genomics, proteomics, imaging and bioinformatics, these researchers bring forward new learnings and solutions in efforts to revolutionize treatment strategies for some of the most challenging diseases.

Areas of interest include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • Innovative biomarker applications to inform target identification, disease characterization and treatment optimization:
    • Diagnostic approaches to stratify/select patients most likely to benefit from therapy
    • Pharmacodynamic assessment of dose and treatment response
    • Biomarkers of emerging or novel clinical endpoints (e.g., minimal residual disease)
    • Technologies and systems to elucidate disease biology (including the tumor microenvironment) and mechanisms of resistance
  • Biomarker and bioanalytical technologies and platforms:
    • Novel histopathology approaches; multiplexed fluorescence-based platforms and digital pathology and imaging analysis software applications
    • Multicolored flow cytometry assays (exploratory and diagnostic grade), for both peripheral and tumoral assessment
    • Proteomic technologies including high-resolution or high-plex applications
    • Genomic-based platforms covering qPCR, ddPCR and NGS: gene expression profiling and tumor and germline DNA deep sequencing; spatial transcriptomics and single-cell RNAseq; methylation and epigenomic profiling; liquid biopsy applications (cfDNA and cfRNA)
    • Novel radiomic imaging capabilities and alternate tracer platforms