Pharma has undergone tremendous changes. From a physician perspective we see cost to our patients as a large issue, as well as the length of time for FDA approval for new drugs. Another issue is sales rep access to physicians and the ever present perception of reps buying our business with luncheons, meetings and other inducements.
Hidden behind the scenes is the number of mergers, acquisitions and consolidations in the pharmacy industry, paralleling consolidations of hospitals an health plans.
Many innovative transformative companies have been absorbed by larger entities once it is realized the profitability is marginal and their venture capitalist backers have maximized their investments. It is also reflective of the huge cost of bringing a new compound to market. In many cases the investment is lost on a promising drug that fails in clinical trials.
Among these companies whose logos .have changed are: Sanofi-Aventis, Genzyme, Synthelabo, Schering-Plough, Warner-Lambert, Pharmacia, and Wyeth…..all now part of Pfizer. Welcome and Beecham, great drug companies, now lost somewhere in GlaxoSmithKline. Biotech names like Genentech, Immunex and Imclone vanished, too.
Much of this may have been due to “collateral damage” of the 2008 market crash, investment bank fiasco such as Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, Fannie Mae, and AIG. We should all be happy the taxpayer did not have to bail out Pharma. But wait….that is coming with ObamaCare.
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