Alzheimer's Drug problems

According to Ed Silverman in his Pharmalot blog, Myriad Genetics is discontinuing development of Flurizan, their Alzheimer's drug. But there is a bigger issue at stake here than just the failure of one drug. As Ed writes in his blog:

The failure is significant because Flurizan was one of the first drugs to reach late-stage testing that tried to prevent the buildup of amyloid plaque in the brain, a focus of much research into Alzheimer’s. Whether this will raise questions about other drugs targeting amyloid plaque remains to be seen.

Wyeth and Elan are jointly developing a drug that tries to block amyloid plaque and, so far, have generated considerable interest, even though preliminary Phase II results were mixed. Lilly is also in late-stage testing of a drug that works simlarly to Flurizan

Bottom line....are all these companies chasing after the wrong cure for Alzheimer's?

Pharma and the UK

According to an article in Thursday's Financial Times
Leading pharmaceutical groups are cutting back on clinical research in the UK, claiming insufficient commitment by the government and the National Health Service to support new drug development.

Pfizer of the US, Roche of Switzerland and Merck-Serono of Germany are among the companies which have told the Financial Times they have, or will, reduce the number of British patients enrolled in trials to test experimental medicines for life-threatening diseases such as cancer.

The article goes on the quote Harpal Kumar, who is the head of Cancer Research UK, who said:

“In the long-term there is a serious risk that if we get to the point where none of the new drugs are being used in the UK, the trials won’t be done here.”

There are many issues that can be addressed concerning the ongoing debate between the Government in the UK and the Pharma industry over the issues of costs. But the overriding issue here is that people in the UK will ultimately be denied access to new innovative drug treatments. Innovative treatments that save lives will be available in the future, but for people in the UK, they will not have the option of using them. That is a crime.

Novartis CEO - "Teva is better than we are."

File this quote under the category of 'Things you don't hear every day".
In a recent interview, Novartis CEO Dan Vasella said:

“Teva is better than we are, and that’s hard to take."

But Vasella did add:

“It is good to look at how we could be better.”

How often do you hear a CEO so openly praising the competition?
How often do you hear a CEO so openly criticizing his own organization?

War for Talent impacts the FDA

According to this article in the Hartford Courant, even the FDA is not immune to the effects of the War for Talent. Private sector Pharmaceutical companies have been poaching talent from the FDA, and it looks like there is no end in sight for the 'Brain Drain' at the Agency.

Biotech Mega Deals

Earlier in the week, Rueters reported that Ernst & Young had just released their annual Global Biotech Survey. According to the Consulting Firm:

"One or more mega acquisitions of mature biotechnology companies along the lines witnessed with MedImmune -- and nearly seen with Biogen Idec in 2007 -- is likely."

But do big deals make sense? Some experts believe smaller, more targeted, deals provide better results. And there is probably a lot more validity to the latter approach of smaller deals.
As one of my friends is fond of saying, "If you take one large empty drug pipeline and combine it with another large empty drug pipeline, you get one VERY LARGE....EMPTY PIPELINE."

Bigger isn't always better.

Happy Anniversary!!!

On a personal note...today The Harrison Group celebrates 12 years in business.
I started the firm on 5/23/96. Starting and operating The Harrison Group has been by far...with the exception of the birth of my kids....the most significant event of my life. I wouldn't trade my experience of running this company for anything. It really has been that great!!!

Good news for Pharma workers

Ed Silverman over a Pharmalot reports here that while there have been a number of layoffs in the Pharma industry, most workers are finding jobs at comparable or higher levels. In fact, Ed writes:

Of those laid off, 73 percent found new jobs at the same or higher level, and 84 percent did so without relocating.

The bottom line is this: People in the Pharmaceutical industry need to realize that while there has been a tremendous amount of change in the industry...while the newspaper seem to be full of negative press about the future of the industry...there still exists a tremendous amount of opportunity in Pharma. The Pharmaceutical Industry is still...by far...the most exciting and rewarding industry out there. People are being laid off...some companies are downsizing...but there is still a lot of hiring going on.

And I see it every day.

Hassan says Schering Plough recovery still on track

Fred Hassan told shareholders at a meeting in Memphis on Friday that he still feels that his turn-around plans for Schering-Plough are still on track. You can see the article here.
But he backs his claim up with some solid facts. Sales at Schering are up by $6.6 Billion in the last four years. And Schering-Plough now has 13 experimental drugs in the final rounds of human testing. That figure is up from 5 in 2003. The recent developments with Vytorin has obviously set Schering back somewhat...but maybe Hassan can still pull off another turn-around...Stay tuned.

Chinese Generics

According to a recent article on Reuters, there soon will be a wave of generics coming out of China.
The end result of this development will be a significant decrease in prices for generics.
The problem is this...if cost becomes the overriding concern for these companies, then quality will eventually suffer. Quality issues when they involve things like toys and consumer products are admittedly an annoyance...but rarely do those issues cause any serious damage. Unfortunately quality issues in products that we ingest can have extremely far-reaching implications.
Stay tuned for more...

Pharma rising

Fierce Biotech reports that profits rose at Novartis, Merck and Lilly. No...this does not signal the end of trouble for the Pharma industry. But - as they wrote in the article - profits are still better than the alternative. You can read the article here.

Pfizer's woes

Crain's New York reports Pfizer 1st quarter profits are down 18%. Ed Silverman on his blog wonders if Pfizer will now slash it dividend. See Ed's take on Pfizer here.

Pharma R&D cuts not as bad as reported

There has been a lot of discussion recently about the job cuts that we are seeing in the Pharma industry. But while the situation is admittedly tough for the people who are being laid-off, the truth is the industry as a whole is still in pretty good shape. As reported in FierceBiotech on 4/9, while there have been cuts,:

The money spent on R&D in the U.S. continues to rise, but after an 11.3 percent hike in 2006 budgets rose only 2.7 percent to a still considerable $35.4 billion.

Again, the industry still experiencing difficulties, but it is by no means decimated. While growth in R&D spending has slowed...the reality is...there still is growth!! While it is easy to get caught up in all the negative press we see about the industry, some times we do need to stop and take a look at the bright side.

What does the Pharma industry need to do?

According to an article in Fox Business [view here]:
"Pharmaceutical companies currently challenged with replacing the $65 billion worth of product expected to go off patent in the next four years must dramatically rethink their R&D models for future success,..."
That's the problem...But how does Big Pharma resolve these problems? The article goes on to discuss a new report just released by Deloitte that just might contain a viable set of solutions. Pharmaceutical companies need modify "...current R&D programs focused on developing a small portfolio of high revenue blockbusters...to R&D programs focused on high efficacy treatments developed for smaller patient populations based on specific genotypes."
Deloitte's study goes on to state that:

"The R&D model of the future will incorporate:

-- R&D strategies which support the assembly of treatment portfolios for the entire disease life cycle and the various genotype specific patient segments in the life cycle, rather than the traditional one-off "blockbuster"

-- Focused R&D programs based on genotyped patients/subjects and biomarkers

-- Virtual, disease-specific R&D networks, incorporating patients, physicians and the medical treatment infrastructure, which involves extensive partnering and collaboration with all the disease knowledge communities

-- Virtual R&D processes with significant outsourcing to maximize flexibility and manage development risk"

The complete report from Deloitte can be viewed here.

Interesting food for thought.

Wyeth lays off 1200 Reps

Wyeth announced they are laying off 1200 Sales Reps. You can read the details here. The question remains...Will other Big Pharma companies follow Wyeth's lead?

AT&T CEO Complains about lack of skilled U.S. workers

The head of AT&T laments the paucity of skilled workers in the U.S. as well the quality of the American education system. You can read the story here.
Bottom line, it's hard to compete in an increasingly global economy without a skilled workforce.

Step out of your comfort zone

Liz Handlin over at Ultimate Resumes Blog has an interesting post today entitled: Stepping Out of Your Comfort Zone May Lead You to the Job of Your Dreams. You can read the entire post here.
In the post Liz discusses the recent experience of one of her clients and what he did to step out of his comfort zone. Liz writes:
"There is a saying that if you keep doing what you have always done you will get the same results that you have always gotten. The opposite is also true: if you do something different than what you have done before you will probably get different results. In the past, C [her client] took a more passive approach to his career which was pretty easy since his skills got him promoted regularly. Now, he is aggressively pursuing options that he is choosing for himself and he can't believe the results he has gotten so far."
Liz is right. Sometimes, in order to really get to the level we desire, not only in our careers but in our lives in general, we need to force ourselves to get out of our ruts...our comfort zones...and try something new.

The E.U.'s Blue Cards for Talent

One of the biggest complaints of Pharmaceutical and Biotech companies that I hear as a Recruiter is the shortage of talent in the marketplace. And, at this moment, it appears that the pool of available talent in the U.S. will only get smaller.
One of the main reasons for this shortage is the current attitude towards immigration in the U.S. America, the land of immigrants, has become decidedly anti-immigrant. While there is valid concern over the influx of illegal immigrants, especially in the Southwest, there has been a tendency to lump all immigrants under one big umbrella. Unfortunately, highly educated immigrants who come to the U.S., who attend our universities and get advanced degrees in the Sciences and Engineering, are finding it increasingly difficult to stay in the U.S. And due to the current rules regarding 'Green Cards' etc., Companies are finding it increasingly hard to hire these people. The current U.S. policies on Immigration are incredibly short-sighted.
Unfortunately, the problem could only get worse for the U.S.
In an article that appeared in InformationWeek here, Marianne Kolbasuk McGee writes:

While the United States continues to argue about whether to raise the H-1B visa cap and reform green-card processes to allow more foreign tech workers into the country, the European Union wants to make it much easier for highly skilled workers from abroad to land jobs in the EU's 27 member countries.

The EU, which is predicting a severe workforce crisis over the next several decades as its Baby Boomer generation retires, aims to attract 20 million workers from the outside in the years to come.

The EU hopes that a new proposed "blue card" will help fill that void, providing a more attractive alternative to the U.S. green-card program, which critics say is plagued by backlogs, cumbersome processes, and insufficient quotas.

In the article, Robert Hoffman, VP for Government and Public Affairs at Oracle beautifully sums up the dilemma faced by companies in the U.S.:

"Europe has sent a message. They're aggressively pursuing the professional talent they need to compete on the global stage...The Senate has unfortunately also sent a message, and it doesn't bode well for the U.S. economy."

The Contingent Workforce

I came across an interesting quote that underscores my point in an earlier post about the need for people to be more proactive in managing their careers. The quote comes from a book entitled: Headhunters - Matchmaking in the Labor Market written by William Finlay & James Coverdill [two professors of Sociology at the University of Georgia]. The book itself is an academic study of the Executive Search industry. In the book the professors write, "A vice president for human resources at AT&T argued, as his company was preparing to lay off thousands of workers, that employees needed to abandon old-fashioned notions of job security: 'People need to look at themselves as self-employed, as vendors who come to this company to see their skills. In AT&T, we have to promote the whole concept of the workforce being contingent.' He went on to suggest that even the very concept of a 'job' was outdated and that employees needed to think of their careers in terms of 'projects' and 'fields of work', for the society was becoming one that was 'jobless but not workless'.
Sage advice indeed.

IMS Health Predicts 5 to 6 Percent Growth for Global Pharmaceutical Market in 2008

IMS, a consulting and business intelligence firm for the Pharmaceutical and Healthcare industries, recently released their Annual Forecast for the Pharmaceutical industry. You can see the Press Release that details some of the findings in the report here. The reports states that 2008 will mark an important point in the history of the industry:
”In several respects, 2008 marks an important inflection point for the global pharmaceutical market,” says Murray Aitken, senior vice president, Healthcare Insight, IMS. “For the first time, the seven largest markets will contribute just half of overall pharmaceutical market growth, while seven emerging markets will contribute nearly 25 percent of growth worldwide. And, as the impact of established pharmaceuticals losing patent protection accelerates, we will see a decline for the first time in the size of the $370 - 380 billion audited market for primary care-driven drugs. In the coming year, biopharmaceutical and generics companies will more aggressively adjust their business models to manage through these inflections, capturing new opportunities in this changing market environment.”
The Pharmaceutical industry is experiencing a dynamic period. Stability is no longer a given.
The key players are changing. The old strategies for managing your career no longer apply. For example, simply joining a company in Big Pharma no longer guarantees a long stable career. Going forward, employees in the Pharmaceutical Industry will need to be more proactive in managing their careers. They will need to be more aware of the changes that are occurring in the industry. And, equally important, they will need to be aware of how those changes will impact their jobs and careers. If nothing else, the future will prove to be exciting.

The Elephant and The Dragon

I just finished a phenomenal book entitled The Elephant and The Dragon by Robyn Meredith.
In the book, Ms. Meredith does a tremendous job explaining not only the reasons behind the rise of China and India, but how their rise impacts the U.S. But Ms. Meredith does not limit her analysis to to the macro level. She also addresses how these changes in the 'World Order' will impact individual workers in the U.S. Her advice for individuals in the U.S. is that:
"Americans should expect change and embrace it, rather than expect to work in the same job for an entire career like the previous generation. Americans must be ready for disruption and willing to undergo retraining to upgrade their skills and be ready to change careers to jump on new job opportunities when they arrive...Those who successfully adapt and meet the challenges will be more likely to have stable or growing paychecks."
Sage advice for all of us as we start the New Year.