It’s a failed industry. I sensed it as early as 1989, when an older & wiser friend waved at all the buildings on the Wellcome Research site in U.K., where we both worked, and asked “What is keeping all this up, do you think?”
We had many long conversations about the state of the industry. We realised that nobody had any idea where new drug concepts came from and that attempts to “Scale the Discovery Engine” through sequential mergers was only having the effect of combining in-line product portfolios and late stage R&D pipelines, only a few of which would ever reach the market and most of those wouldn’t recover their R&D costs.
All sorts of bad behaviour was incentivised by limitations of commercial exclusivity which patents provide those who disclose an invention (which must be novel, useful & not obvious). The longer the development process became & the greater the costs, needed to exclude rare serious adverse effects and to prove superiority over existing, usually cheap, off-patent products, the shorter the useful exclusive period became, until it was too short to allow even the rare, good product that was a worthwhile advance over prior art to yield a sustaining profit.
I was clear by around the age of 40 (turn of the century) that I’d be extremely fortunate if the industry lasted long enough to retire out of it.
By my early 50s I, like tens of thousands of other people, was made redundant in a yet another merger & radical downsizing.
Luckily, I had a few accidental aces up my sleeve. Earlier than most, I’d invested much unrewarded effort in seeking out early stage drugs owned by much smaller companies which might provide the basis for commercial synergies. One in particular made many billions in revenue for both parties and was the most valuable thing I ever did.
These efforts brought me into contact with an ecosystem I was not even really aware of. Small start ups funded by private venture capital. I reviewed over 100 such entities. We did two deals.
After the announcement of the closure of the site at which I worked, I received two calls, independently from people whose biotechs I had previously reviewed and this launched me into consulting.
At dinner for one client, I met an investor who was curious about what was happening to all the portfolio I had worked on. Learning that most of all of it was to be abandoned in cost saving and downsizing, he asserted that i could raise a little capital & perhaps spin out some compounds. A year later, I did just that. For six years I led that biotech until acquisition by a big company & I entered into partial retirement in 2017 (also coinciding with a serious illness).
Then 2020 hit.
I could not take a commission to consult in this industry now. I’ve learned too many things of which I was previously completely unaware, beavering away in research labs. I also wouldn’t recommend anyone follow in my footsteps. That geography no longer exists.
Many of us are grateful for how the latter stages of your career panned out, Mike, in order to allow you to inspire so many people over the last five years. Not that we'd have wished the serious illness on you, obviously. I would agree with your assessment on the Dr de Vliet podcast of some time ago that you were pretty much 'groomed' (in a good way) and picked out for this. God bless.
I think that’s right. Had anyone told me this a decade ago, I’d have tried to get away from them as fast as possible. Looking back though, there are so many absurdly appropriate occurrences during my early life and later career that some kind of assignment seems to me more likely than other explanations. Bless you, too,
I couldn't care less if big pharma bites the dust. All we need are a few emergency type medicines and 80% of the rest can be buried forever. The problem is that big pharma creates poisons that the body does not require to live on or run better. Drugs are the anti-thesis to good health.
Looking at the pharmacy's number of waiting prescriptions for pick-up, you can see how many people depend on their drugs. So why big pharma is going broke when demand is still escalating is a mystery.
No new drugs? They have been rebranding old drugs or slightly altering them and selling them as new. Big money as new drugs are always more expensive.
Good, hope they go broke.
They nearly have Phillip - jail is next...
It’s a failed industry. I sensed it as early as 1989, when an older & wiser friend waved at all the buildings on the Wellcome Research site in U.K., where we both worked, and asked “What is keeping all this up, do you think?”
We had many long conversations about the state of the industry. We realised that nobody had any idea where new drug concepts came from and that attempts to “Scale the Discovery Engine” through sequential mergers was only having the effect of combining in-line product portfolios and late stage R&D pipelines, only a few of which would ever reach the market and most of those wouldn’t recover their R&D costs.
All sorts of bad behaviour was incentivised by limitations of commercial exclusivity which patents provide those who disclose an invention (which must be novel, useful & not obvious). The longer the development process became & the greater the costs, needed to exclude rare serious adverse effects and to prove superiority over existing, usually cheap, off-patent products, the shorter the useful exclusive period became, until it was too short to allow even the rare, good product that was a worthwhile advance over prior art to yield a sustaining profit.
I was clear by around the age of 40 (turn of the century) that I’d be extremely fortunate if the industry lasted long enough to retire out of it.
By my early 50s I, like tens of thousands of other people, was made redundant in a yet another merger & radical downsizing.
Luckily, I had a few accidental aces up my sleeve. Earlier than most, I’d invested much unrewarded effort in seeking out early stage drugs owned by much smaller companies which might provide the basis for commercial synergies. One in particular made many billions in revenue for both parties and was the most valuable thing I ever did.
These efforts brought me into contact with an ecosystem I was not even really aware of. Small start ups funded by private venture capital. I reviewed over 100 such entities. We did two deals.
After the announcement of the closure of the site at which I worked, I received two calls, independently from people whose biotechs I had previously reviewed and this launched me into consulting.
At dinner for one client, I met an investor who was curious about what was happening to all the portfolio I had worked on. Learning that most of all of it was to be abandoned in cost saving and downsizing, he asserted that i could raise a little capital & perhaps spin out some compounds. A year later, I did just that. For six years I led that biotech until acquisition by a big company & I entered into partial retirement in 2017 (also coinciding with a serious illness).
Then 2020 hit.
I could not take a commission to consult in this industry now. I’ve learned too many things of which I was previously completely unaware, beavering away in research labs. I also wouldn’t recommend anyone follow in my footsteps. That geography no longer exists.
Many of us are grateful for how the latter stages of your career panned out, Mike, in order to allow you to inspire so many people over the last five years. Not that we'd have wished the serious illness on you, obviously. I would agree with your assessment on the Dr de Vliet podcast of some time ago that you were pretty much 'groomed' (in a good way) and picked out for this. God bless.
I think that’s right. Had anyone told me this a decade ago, I’d have tried to get away from them as fast as possible. Looking back though, there are so many absurdly appropriate occurrences during my early life and later career that some kind of assignment seems to me more likely than other explanations. Bless you, too,
Praise the Lord. Cracks in the evil empire are happening!!!
My favorite parts of Covid:
#84
Covid is a stimulus package.
To stimulate the transfer of your wealth to people like me.
Before you die.
That way, your family, and your children, will be economically dependent on people …
Like me.
.
Im ok with them in trouble. Also praying RFK Jr would bring our drug makers back to America.
I couldn't care less if big pharma bites the dust. All we need are a few emergency type medicines and 80% of the rest can be buried forever. The problem is that big pharma creates poisons that the body does not require to live on or run better. Drugs are the anti-thesis to good health.
Looking at the pharmacy's number of waiting prescriptions for pick-up, you can see how many people depend on their drugs. So why big pharma is going broke when demand is still escalating is a mystery.
No new drugs? They have been rebranding old drugs or slightly altering them and selling them as new. Big money as new drugs are always more expensive.
Important