Adopt A Hybrid Business Model For Better Sales – Not A Large Field Force

For aggressive business expansion or to attain greater market access, creating a large sales force has been the thumb rule in the pharma industry, since long. To meet the challenge of changing market dynamics, going for a thorough re-engineering of even a rattling sales and marketing machine, is still considered a risky proposition.

Many studies have captured the common reasons of such hesitations. For example, the McKinsey article titled, ‘Cutting sales costs, not revenues,’ finds that field force being a major growth engine for sales, since long, the thought of overhauling it fills senior executives with dread. Thus, to keep sales flowing, companies will make piecemeal ongoing repairs as long as they can – ‘no matter how patched up or spluttering that engine may be.’

Nevertheless, some compelling business reasons have now prompted several pharma players to accept the ground reality – fast-evolving over the last one and half decades. Many of them have realized that in today’s changing market dynamics, a leaner and smarter sales force (or field force or medical rep, or MR) will fetch the desired results than ‘flabby’ and larger ones.

In this article, I shall not discuss the obvious reasons of downsizing, such as to record profit under trying circumstances, or when per rep productivity keeps declining consistently, or during a change in the promoted product-mix, or a decision to reduce focus on volume intensive-low margin generic brands. But, what I shall discuss is, the reasons for an urgent need of creating a hybrid sales and marketing model, during this changing paradigm.  

It begins with accepting a change in the business environment: 

If the objective of sales force size reduction remains limited to cost-cutting for short-term improvement of the bottom-line, it could be grossly counterproductive, possibly with many unforeseen consequences. Field staff will continue to remain one of the key growth drivers in pharma and biotech business, but not the sole mechanism to increase brand prescriptions. Finding a well-integrated alternative model would begin with acceptance of a significant change in pharma business environment.

Undoubtedly, a perceptible change is noticeable today in pharma stakeholders’ mindset. This change is being further fueled by rapid increases in their usage of various digital platforms and networks. For example, many patients are trying to be reasonably informed of even various disease treatment options and the cost of each, much before they visit a doctor’s clinic or a hospital. The nature and quality of their interaction with health care providers, including doctors, are also changing. Patient-experience during a treatment process, and the value offerings that come with a pharma brand, will have increasing relevance to business performance – more than even before. Anything going against the patient-interest will possibly be shared with all, mostly in social media, which has a potential to precipitate serious consequences.

As this trend keeps going north, pharma market dynamics would change, commensurately, making pharma’s key business success factors significantly different with medical reps no longer being the sole prescription generators. A new hybrid – digitally empowered sales and marketing model is, therefore, the need of the hour. In this new ball game, as a growth driver, the role and size of the field staff will be quite different, where the senior management warrants a new vision for pharma business.

The situation warrants a new vision for pharma business:

In this changing situation, to generate more prescriptions from doctors by deploying a large field force, could prove akin to swimming against a strong tide. Whereas for achieving business success at this time, pharma players would require creating a well-oiled augmented value delivery system for enhanced customer experience, primarily for patients during their entire treatment process.

While creating this sleek and effective system, it would be necessary to cut unproductive or less productive flab in the frontline, with great precision. However, this process must be dovetailed with implementation of other communication and customer engagement platforms, mostly digital, to achieve the set objectives.

The new strategy being augmented value delivery to customers, the process would entail, besides innovative and modern tools, a different genre of field staff members, possessing some critical skill-sets. The goal of need-based field force downsizing complemented by new synchronous measures for operational synergy, must not only be clear to senior management, but also be explained to all concerned.

What would ‘augmented value delivery’ to customers lead to?

Another McKinsey article titled, ‘The few, the proud, the super-productive - how a smart field force can better drive sales,’ articulated: ‘Indeed, our perspective on the past five years is that leaders that used field reductions to actually rethink the commercial model – rather than taking a “blunt instrument” approach to cuts – are reaping rewards.’

As the current pharma sales and marketing models are undergoing a metamorphosis, globally – this transition phase throws several tough challenges – from defining new roles and capabilities for field staff to creative use of various interactive communication platforms.  As the McKinsey article underscores: ‘new capabilities need to be added even as we continue to use the tried and true current model, albeit with less success.  It further adds: ‘The inconvenient truth: we will have to sweat the current model and build the capabilities for the future in parallel. Those hoping for a ‘flip the switch’ transition, are likely to be disappointed.” With his, I reckon, will emerge a robust ‘augmented value delivery system’ for the business leading to:

  • Higher profitable sales through satisfied customers
  • Increase in sales per employee ratio
  • Containing/reducing sales and marketing spend as a percentage of total revenue.

Several initiatives to translate this concept into reality is now palpable, globally. A few examples may suffice to drive home this point.

Downsizing field force complemented by new measures for synergy pays:

Here also there are several research studies to bring home this point. One such is the paper titled, ‘Big pharma proves that oncology pays as workforces shrink,’ published in ’Vantage’ of Evaluate on July 23, 2018. The researchers touched upon this area while discussing the workforce productivity for Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS). It found that a substantial shrinking of its workforce, alongside some other important measures, has given BMS a big boost in sales, with a dramatic impact on its overall performance. As the study indicated, even investors will find this fact hard to ignore. Let me hasten to add that ‘downsizing workforce’ mainly involved sales and R&D staff in this analysis.

The article further highlighted, during the period of 2007 to 20017, the management teams of some other pharma majors, as well, such as GlaxoSmithKline), AstraZeneca and Eli Lilly, either reduced their workforce significantly or kept flat. According to this study the changes in the workforce of these 4 companies are as follows:

Workforce Bristol-Myers Squibb GlaxoSmithKline AstraZeneca Eli Lilly
2007 42,000 103,483 67,400 40,600
2017 23,700 98,462 61,100 40,655

However, even in the year 10, all the four companies - Bristol-Myers SquibbGlaxoSmithKlineAstraZeneca and Eli Lilly posted not just sales growth, bit all-round performance improvement, as may be seen by clicking on each.

Having deliberated on the impact of downsizing field force, let me now focus on powerful complementary measures for augmented value delivery to customers.

Today’s reality for pharma business in India can’t be wished away:

The EYstudy titled, ‘Reinventing pharma sales and marketing through digital in India,’ captures the current situation quite well. I am quoting below just a few of those:

  • Today’s tech-savvy physicians are relying far less on reps and more on digital devices for healthcare information. Only 11 percent of healthcare professionals in India prefer in-person visits from a company representative, according to a 2016 study by Health Link Dimensions. Likewise, many patients arming themselves with medical knowledge available online, gradually relying less on only physicians’ decision-making. Thus, the rules of engagement need to be redefined.
  • With a shift in focus toward more complex or specialty medicines, pharma companies continue to add new layers of MRs to increase geographic coverage. The increasing number of MRs and the number of brands under each of them have drastically reduced the time and quality of sales pitches – from being scientific to mere brand name reminders.
  • Physicians’ place at the center of the pharma ecosystem as almost the sole-decision makers, is very likely to become a thing of the past with the emergence of a broad array of customers with a new mindset.
  • New tech-based entrants providing information platforms, analytics, e-consultation services and access to medicine online are challenging pharma’s value creation story.

Enhancing customer experience needs a hybrid business model:

The new market dynamics, demands cutting-edge brand-value augmentation measures, enhancing customer-experience with some tangible benefits. These telltale signs can only be ignored at one’s own peril. Let me also illustrate this point with the findings from another research study.

According to 2015 Oncology Customer Experience Tracker of ZS, “Oncology companies can add USD 50 – USD 75 million in incremental sales for every USD 1 billion in current sales by delivering a better customer experience.”

This vindicates that creating a better customer experience should be the key goal of pharma’s augmented value delivery system – going much beyond the traditional communication of key product features and its clinical benefits. This new concept is fast emerging as the fulcrum – not just for creating a strong brand pull, but also enhancing the public image of the organization. And can be achieved with a right blend of:

  • ‘Must do’ mindset of top management,
  • Expertise in well-targeted – multi-channel content making,
  • Expertise on data-science and analytics to churn out the right information from a large pool of data,
  • Wherewithal for effectively using the right digital platforms, either directly to customers or through a leaner and digitally-skilled sales force having a ‘can do’ attitude, as the situation will demand.

Some companies are testing the water:

Conventional ways to improve Sales Force Effectiveness (SFE), especially with soft skills, besides, of course product knowledge, is not new to the pharma players. What they need to do is change the primary focus of increasing sales through delivering mostly the key intrinsic value of the brand, to increase profitable sales by delivering augmented brand value, leading to enhanced customer satisfaction.

This is a major shift from the traditional paradigm and would surely entail application of digital technology and data science. As I wrote before, many companies have started adopting this approach – mostly with one baby step at a time, right or wrong.

Observation and findings of an India specific study: 

Noting that ‘Indian pharma’s journey to a digital world has just begun,’ the same EYstudy, as quoted above, reported the following findings, among a few others:

  • Lack of a clear digital strategy/value proposition and change management are the two key barriers to embracing digital.
  • Whatever was being done manually earlier is now being done digitally. But we are not adding additional value. On the other hand, companies globally are now cautiously moving toward being digital practitioners.
  • Indian pharma majors will need to grow into integrated health care providers – offering both products and services, forging patient-centric partnerships and demonstrating value to a broad array of customer groups.

The good news is, some of the key observations of the study also include the following:

  • Some are using digital technology to capture untapped and unstructured data, to make their sales and marketing decision making process more agile and robust.
  • Powerful apps with dynamic, meaningful content and the right value proposition are gaining popularity.
  • Several players, while staying within the realms of regulatory boundaries, are enabling patients to actively manage their care. 

Conclusion:

As we look around, many drug companies, especially in India, continue to remain focused on the age-old transactional sales and marketing models, delivering the intrinsic brand values, irrespective of the changing pharma market dynamics, especially disregarding what today’s customers in the knowledge economy look for. Traditional training and incentivizing a large, and often flabby, sales force on product and rupee value territory-sales against the target, are the general ways to achieve these. The focus on achieving the internal sales targets, regardless of the processes being contentious or not.

Modern time warrants a different conversation altogether – creation of a unique customer experience – with augmented value delivery systems. Achieving this goal would entail astute applications of modern technology, complementing the reach and impact of the right-sized field staff efforts, and leading to improvement in ‘sales per employee ratio.’

Thus, I reckon, higher sales or the need for an expanded market access, may not necessarily entail a larger field force, but a new breed of leaner and especially skilled MR to deliver the needs of the changing healthcare landscape.

By: Tapan J. Ray     

Disclaimer: The views/opinions expressed in this article are entirely my own, written in my individual and personal capacity. I do not represent any other person or organization for this opinion.

Will ‘Patent Thicket’ Delay Biosimilar Drug Entry in India?

Do pharma and biotech investors encourage companies indulging in ‘patent thicket?’ This question recently grabbed media headlines. On April 02, 2019, one such report brought out: AbbVie investors are calling for the Chair-CEO power split, flagging the CEO’s USD 4 million bonus payout, fueled by the company’s Humira ‘patent thicket’ strategy related aggressive price hikes. It prolonged the brand’s market monopoly, blocking entries of its cheaper biosimilar equivalents.

I have discussed some related issues in this blog, previously. As the issue is gaining relevance also in the Indian context, this article will deliberate the ill-effects of ‘patent thicket’ on patient health-interest. The sole beneficiaries for the creation of this self-serving labyrinth are the manufacturers of high-priced patented drugs, as reported above. Before I proceed further, let me recapitulate what exactly is a ‘patent thicket.’

‘Patent Thicket’:

The dictionary definition of patent thicket is: ‘A group of patents in a field of technology which collectively impede a party from commercializing its own patents or products in that field.’In the current context, it means a dense web of overlapping patent rights that restrict a generic or a biosimilar drug maker from commercializing its cheaper equivalents post expiry of the original patent.

This scenario has been well-captured by the above media report, which states: “AbbVie leadership has also been accused of creating a ‘patent thicket’ in its battle to stave off biosimilar competitors to Humira.” Boehringer Ingelheim is among the few still fighting AbbVie’s ‘patent thicket’ hoping to launch its Humira biosimilar - Cyltezo, even after receiving US-FDA approval on August 29, 2017. ‘Top biosimilar makers, including Novartis’ Sandoz unit and Mylan, have settled their own Humira patent fights with deals that put off launches until 2023,’ the report indicated.

In its favor: AbbVie says, Cyltezo infringes about 70 patents the company currently holds for Humira. Whereas, ‘Boehringer’s lawyers say AbbVie’s copious patents overlapped in an attempt to exclude competitors from the market.’ Notably, in March this year, New York’s UFCW Local 1500 Welfare Fund, reportedly, also accused AbbVie of using overlapping patents to exclude biosimilars.

‘Patent thicket’ – a way of ‘evergreening’ beyond 20 years patent term:

Much concern is being raised about various ploys of especially by the drug MNC and their lobby groups – directly or under a façade, to delay entry of cheaper generic drugs for greater patient access. Mostly the following two ways are followed for patent ‘evergreening’ beyond the term of 20 years:

  • ‘Incremental innovation’ of the existing patented drugs through molecular manipulation, with its clinical performance and safety profile remaining similar to the original one. As the cost benefits of such drugs are not shared with patients, cannibalizing the sales of the older molecular version with the newer one highlighting its newness, the sales revenue can be protected. With this approach, coupled with marketing muscle power with deep-pocket the impact of generic entry of the older version can almost be made redundant. For example: Omeprazole was first marketed in 1989 by AstraZeneca, under the brand name Losec (later changed to Prilosec at the behest of the US-FDA). When Prilosec’s US patent expired in April 2001, AstraZeneca introduced esomeprazole (Nexium) as a patented replacement drug. Both are nearly identical in their clinical efficacy and safety.
  • ‘Patent thicket’ is yet another tool for ‘evergreening’, delaying launch of similar drugs, or resorting to ‘pay for delay’ sort of deals. As another recent report reiterates, AbbVie’s ‘patent thicket’ for Humira, has deterred other potential challengers, such as Amgen, Samsung Bioepis and most recently Mylan, each of which struck settlements with AbbVie to delay their biosimilar challenges in the United States.

Goes against patients’ health interest:

On May 09, 2018, the Biosimilars Council reported, just as generic medicines saved Americans USD 1.67 trillion in the last decade, biosimilars are poised to do the same – ‘if they aren’t thwarted by delaying tactics instituted by some pharmaceutical companies.’ Echoing similar concern, the outgoing US-FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb also, reportedly said, ‘some drugmakers are using unacceptable tactics such as litigation and rebate schemes to stall the entry of cheaper copies.’

‘Of the nine biosimilars the FDA has approved to date, only three have made it into the hands of patients – an alarmingly small number. Patients can’t access the six others due to barriers thrown in their way by pharmaceutical companies that want to protect their monopolies and keep prices high,’ highlights the Biosimilars Council report. Net sufferer of this self-serving ‘patent thicket’ strategy of pharma and biotech players to extend product patents beyond 20 years, are those patients who need these drugs the most – to save their lives.

Despite law, patent ‘evergreening’ still not uncommon in India:

With section (3d) on the Indian Patents Act 2005 in place, the country is expected to protect itself from patent ‘evergreening’ through ‘incremental innovation.’ This section articulates:“For the purposes of this clause, salts, esters, ethers, polymorphs, metabolites, pure form, particle size, isomers, mixtures of isomers, complexes, combinations and other derivatives of known substance shall be considered to be the same substance, unless they differ significantly in properties with regard to efficacy.”

On this ground, Indian Patent Office (IPO) rejected Novartis’ drug Glivec (imatinib mesylate) patent application, which was ultimately upheld by the Supreme Court in 2013. Nevertheless, a study report of April 30, 2018 emphasized: ‘Though the law with regard to anti-evergreening, upheld and clarified by Indian courts, remains on the books, its application by the IPO has been far from satisfactory.’

The esteemed author of the report, after analyzing about 2,300 drug patents, granted between 2009 and 2016 concluded that evergreening practices may be rampant in India. The report pointed out, ‘the IPO could be operating with an error rate as high as 72 percent for secondary patents, despite provisions to keep them in check.’

Are these IPO’s mistakes, or due to external pressure?

As the paper, published in the January 2016 edition of the Journal of Intellectual Property Rights (JIPR) said,‘The multi-national pharma companies (MNCs) and the US-India Business Council (USIBC) have suggested in their report for elimination of Section 3 (d) so that drug patents can be granted in India for incremental improvement and modification. As per US 301 report, India is listed among countries with inadequate IP regime.’ Keeping all these aspects into consideration, the article expressed some key concerns pertaining to the impact of Section 3 (d) with special emphasis on its interpretation. Does it mean any possibility of wilting under such extraneous and high impact pressure?

A fresh pressure from drug MNC on the DCGI:

Since long drug MNCs have been attempting to delay the entry of even those generics, which are fully compliant with the Indian Patent Law 2005. One such effort was their demand for ‘patent linkage’ with the marketing approval of new generic drugs. However, it could not pass through legal scrutiny – first by the Delhi High Court in the Bayer Cipla case in 2010, and then by the Supreme Court – on the same case. The Court, reportedly, ‘noted the Indian patent system was distinct from the drug regulatory system with no linkage between them and so Bayer can’t prevent DCGI from granting marketing approval to generic versions of patented drugs.’

According to another recent media report of April 04, 2019, in a fresh endeavor ‘to delay launch of low priced generic medicine, multinational drug makers have asked the government to create a registry providing information about all drug applications pending manufacturing and marketing approval. The proposal, which is still pending with the Department of Pharmaceuticals (DoP), if accepted, could involve the generic players into expensive and time-consuming litigations, delaying early market entry of the cheaper generic or biosimilar equivalents.

To date, the health ministry has opposed the proposal, as it will be “unfair to local drug manufacturers to disclose their product strategy” and also has “the potential to substantially increase health care costs for the public.” The government further argued, “such information about product applications filed for approval are not disclosed anywhere in the world.”

India encourages new drug innovation, but not at any cost:

Despite shrill and disparaging comments of MNC lobbyists and the strong vested interests, that India’s Patent Law 2005, doesn’t encourage innovation, many independent international experts do praise the same for the following reasons:

  • Does encourage new drug innovation
  • Does extend product exclusivity for twenty years
  • Strikes a right balance with patients’ health interest
  • Indian judicial system deals with patient infringements and disputes, just as any other developed countries
  • Even 14 years after the enactment of patent laws, just one compulsory license has been granted, which is much less than other countries, including the United States.

What India doesn’t legally allow is, unfettered profit making through ‘evergreening of drug patents’ – at the cost of millions of patients-lives. Nonetheless, powered by deep pockets, the pharma and biotech players are unlikely to cease from this practice, anytime soon. Only patient-awareness, and stringent counter-legal measures can contain this unfair game of drug monopoly practices – in the name of ‘encouraging innovation’.

Conclusion:

The article titled, ‘Over patented, overpriced: How Excessive Pharmaceutical Patenting is Extending Monopolies and Driving up Drug Prices’ revealed:“Top grossing drugs have on average 125 patent applications, which are filed with a strategic intent to extend the commercial monopolies far beyond the intended twenty years of protection.” It also quoted American President Donald Trump as saying, “Our patent system will reward innovation, but it will not be used as a shield to protect unfair monopolies.”

Coming back to ‘patent thicket’ and the same classic case, another report of March 20, 2019 indicated, a new class action lawsuit filed by New York’s largest grocery union has accused AbbVie of violating antitrust and consumer protection laws, which AbbVie has defended by saying that its patent strategy for Humira has protected the investments that are necessary to “advance healthcare.”

Pharma and biotech companies’ maintaining patent monopolies far beyond twenty years has significant consequences on India’s healthcare system. Only patent lawyers and experts can possibly answer whether or not the Indian Patent Law 2005 can effectively deal with the practice of ‘evergreening’ with patent thicket. Intriguingly, taking a cue from recent developments, it seems many pharma and biotech investors too, deem ‘patent thicket’ rather distracting for longer-term undiluted focus on new product development, and sustainable investors’ return.

That apart, the question also comes, whether just as ‘antitrust and consumer protection laws’ in the US, the Competition Law of India will be able to do contain such unfair practices? Otherwise, with MNC lobbyists’ renewed activities in this area, ‘patent thicket’, especially for expensive biologic drugs, will delay market-entry of their cheaper biosimilar versions in India, as well, just as what is happening in the developed nations.

By: Tapan J. Ray   

Disclaimer: The views/opinions expressed in this article are entirely my own, written in my individual and personal capacity. I do not represent any other person or organization for this opinion.

How Creative Is Pharma Industry?

“Because the purpose of business is to create a customer, the business enterprise has two – and only two – basic functions: marketing and innovation. Marketing and innovation produce results; all the rest are costs. Marketing is the distinguishing, unique function of the business,” said the management guru of all times – Peter Drucker, decades ago. He further added, “The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer, so well the product or service fits him and sells itself.” What needs to be underscored in this visionary articulation of Drucker is, effective marketing should create such a strong pull for a product or service that renders hard selling less relevant.

The word ‘innovation’ is used frequently within the pharma industry, and more by the multi-national players on a specific context. The purpose is mainly to douse stakeholder concern on high prices of innovative drugs – building a narrative around expensive, complex and time-intensive drug innovation process. That said, just as creativity is necessary to discover new drugs, creative minds also help in effectively reducing the cost of innovation – creating more customers for the company.

Curiously, in this debate the other key business function – ‘marketing’, often takes a back seat, with its usage getting generally restricted to product features and benefits, including ‘freebies’ of various kinds. Neither is there any palpable effort to make the culture of ‘creativity’ and ‘innovation’ prevail across the organization, for overcoming several critical growth barriers that keep looming over all functional areas.

Is it happening because of a hubris, as it were, within the pharma and biotech industry? This article will try to figure out why this has been happening over decades and would also ponder whether the time is ripe for changing the charted path of the business model. For a clear understanding of all, let me start with the difference between creativity and innovation from the business perspective.

Creativity – a fundamental requirement in a business, is different from innovation:  

This was examined in the article titled, ‘The Importance of Creativity in Business,’ published by Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts, on November 09, 2017. It emphasized, although “creativity” and “innovation” are often used interchangeably, these are two separate concepts. “Creativity is different because it is a mechanism to being innovative. You can have great ideas, but not be innovative,” the paper underscored. It brought to the fore that ‘creativity’ – being the fundamental ingredient for being ‘innovative’, is essential in the highly competitive business environment. It fuels big ideas, challenges the employees’ way of thinking, and opens the door to new business opportunities.

The IBM study also confirms this fact:

The study titled, ‘‘Capitalizing on Complexity: Insights from the Global Chief Executive Officer Study,’ led by the IBM Institute for Business Value and IBM Strategy & Change, also confirmed the above fact. The study is the fourth edition of IBM’s biennial Global CEO Study series, involving more than 1,500 Chief Executive Officers from 60 countries and 33 industries worldwide.

The study reported, CEOs selected creativity as the most important leadership attribute and the number one factor for future business success. It added: ‘Creative leaders invite disruptive innovation, encourage others to drop outdated approaches and take balanced risks. They are open-minded and inventive in expanding their management and communication styles, particularly to engage with a new generation of employees, partners and customers.’ Importantly, ‘creativity’ ranked higher than rigor, management discipline, integrity or even vision, as each of these will require creativity. According to the study, successfully navigating through an increasing complex world of ‘accelerated industry transformation, growing volumes of data, rapidly evolving customer preferences, can be overcome by instilling ‘creativity’ throughout an organization.

‘Necessity is the mother of invention’ – does it apply to pharma, as well?  

In today’s complex business environment, pharma’s business challenges are spreading rapidly across many areas. Besides innovation of new drugs, following are four broad, but critical areas, where fostering of creativity, innovative thinking and invention of game changing ideas, across the organization, I reckon, can fetch a sustainable return, in a win-win way:

  • Intense ‘pricing pressure’ to make innovative drugs affordable for greater access to patients: Just as innovative ideas are of fundamental importance to develop new drugs; disruptive innovative ideas in this area, can help resolve this issue, effectively – not any incremental measure.
  • Declining corporate image and eroding public trust: Placing patients’ interest at the center of the business model, and then effective marketing of the same, can reverse this trend, with better business outcomes.
  • Lack of business transparency: Make business processes, including pricing, sales and marketing more transparent, by leveraging the power of data with modern technology.
  • Declining per dollar marketing productivity: Move away from the old and traditional business models to find a new pathway for success, using the process of simulation, on an ongoing basis.

While above are some of the pressing needs for steering the course of pharma and biotech industry, the business keeps charting the same patch, with a bit of tweaking, here or there. Thus, the good old saying – ‘necessity is the mother of invention,’ still doesn’t work in pharma.  The question, therefore, is why? We shall discuss it in just a bit. Before that, let me explore how creative the pharma industry, joining some critical dots.

How creative is pharma and biotech industry?

To explore this area, I shall try to touch upon the following two points:

  • Is there any perceptible financial impact on pharma sales revenue, net profit and gross operating margin, for not creatively resolving some critical growth barriers, as stated above?
  • Where does pharma and biotech industry stand in global ‘creativity ranking’?

For this purpose, when I look at the following four major areas, some interesting findings emerge:

  • Top 10 in sales revenue.
  • Top 10 in net profit
  • Average Gross and Operating Margin
  • Creativity ranking of some major pharma and biotech companies

Top 10 in sales revenue:

The overall sales revenue of the pharma/biotech companies remains healthy. On the face of it, there doesn’t seem to be any storm signal.  According to Market Research Reports, Inc. the top 10 companies on 2018 sales revenue, are as follows:

  1. Pfizer Inc.: USD 53.647 Billion
  2. Novartis AG: USD 51.90 Billion
  3. Roche Holding AG: USD 45.5896 Billion
  4. Johnson & Johnson: USD 40.734 Billion
  5. Sanofi S.A: USD 39.288 Billion
  6. Merck & Co., Inc.: USD 37.689 Billion
  7. AbbVie Inc.: USD 32.753 Billion
  8. Amgen: USD 23.7 Billion
  9. GSK: USD 22.968 Billion
  10. Bristol-Myers Squibb: USD 22.600 Billion 

Top 10 in net profit:

There isn’t any storm signal visible in this area, either, as it is seen in isolation. According to Statista, the 2018 ranking of the top 10 biotech and pharmaceutical companies worldwide, based on net income, as appeared in the Financial Times 2018 equity screener database, is as follows:

Rank

Company

Net income ($ Billion)

1.

Johnson & Johnson (USA)

15

2.

Novartis (Switzerland)

13.8

3.

Pfizer (USA)

11.9

4.

Roche (Switzerland)

10.5

5.

Amgen (USA)

8.5

6.

Gilead (USA)

7.7

7.

AbbVie USA)

6.8

8.

Novo Nordisk (Denmark)

6.0

9.

Bayer (Germany)

4.3

10.

Biogen (USA)

4.1

Let’s now look at the average gross and operating margin in the pharma and biotech industry.

Average Gross and operating Margin – still the best:  

This also looks healthy, as compared to others. According to the January 2018 study by New York University’s Stern School of Business, average gross margin of 481 biotech and 237 pharma and biotech companies was reported at 70.71 percent and 68.60 percent, respectively. And their operating margins were at 25.45 percent and 24.89 percent, severally – against 12.32 percent of all the 7209 companies surveyed.

Creativity ranking of some commonly known pharma and biotech companies:

Here there seems to be an issue. When I look at the 2018 Forbes list of ‘The World’s Most Innovative Companies,’ it will be challenging to find any of the above top names of the pharma and biotech companies within the Top 100 ranking. Just to illustrate the point, let me reproduce below some commonly known names of our industry:

Rank Company Country 12-month sales growth% Innovation Premium%
#7. Incyte USA 38.93 70.59
#14. Celltrion S. Korea 45.25 62.3
#16. Regeneron Pharmaceuticals USA 20.82 61.11
#17. Vertex Pharmaceuticals USA 46.2 60.93
#22. Alexion Pharmaceuticals USA 17.32 58.04
#82. Allergan Ireland 9.4 37.59

Some interesting possibilities:

The above data, points towards some interesting possibilities:

  • Because of its sales and profit margin remaining generally lucrative, the focus on innovation of most pharma and biotech companies, get restricted to new drug discovery and development processes.
  • Top management’s encouragement of creativity across all functions of the organization appears inadequate, to successfully navigate through the key growth barriers, to maintain future business sustainability.

But, some critical signals do indicate: ‘shape up or ship out’:

But the real picture isn’t as rosy. Analysis of some key trends does capture several critical storm signals for the industry According to the July 09, 2018 study of EY (Ernst and Young): ‘Margins of pharmaceutical companies are continuing to decline – the future lies in new ecosystems.’ It further indicated: Although the margins of the 21 largest pharmaceutical companies in the world are declining, the businesses ‘are still growing, thanks to blockbuster drugs and new active ingredients against cancer. 40 per cent of the active ingredients that are currently being developed worldwide are cancer drugs.’

The paper concluded, the future lies in designing completely new types of ecosystems and business models. With the aim of providing comprehensive support for healthcare customers, including patients. “Data-driven business models will permanently change the pharmaceutical industry,” the paper articulated. The study forecasted, ‘life Science startups will take over between 30 and 45 per cent of the market by 2030.’ Isn’t this a clear signal, especially for large and longtime pharma players to ‘shape up or ship out?’

Conclusion: 

Let me now revert to what Peter Drucker said on two basic functions of a business – Innovation and Marking. None can question pharma on its consistently bringing to market innovative drugs to effectively tackle many diseases, including complex and life-threatening ones. Given, that ongoing new drug development is the lifeblood of growth of pharma business. Nevertheless, that aspect of innovation is mostly perceived as an exclusive internal business value for most companies. The majority of stakeholders perceives the value of drug innovation as inclusive, when it is made accessible to a large population of patients at an affordable price, along with a decent Return on Investment (ROI) for the corporation. This expectation cannot be wished away. Instead, its core concept should drive the other basic function of business – marketing

This stage can be attained by building an innovative organization, fostering the culture and process of ‘creativity’ – across its functions. It is now a fundamental requirement for pharma and biotech companies. Beyond new product development, innovation immensely helps organizations navigating through strong headwinds to achieve its financial goals and objectives, in an inclusive manner. When IT – another knowledge industry, can reduce the cost of innovation through creative processes, across all functions, making its product and services affordable to a large population, e.g. Reliance Jio, why not Pharma? In that sense, I reckon, pharma and biotech companies are yet to become creative – in a holistic way.

By: Tapan J. Ray     

Disclaimer: The views/opinions expressed in this article are entirely my own, written in my individual and personal capacity. I do not represent any other person or organization for this opinion.

Would ‘Connected Healthcare’ Catch Pharma Players Off-Guard?

Rapid advancement of medical science is making several life-threatening diseases easily preventable, curable and manageable. For some conditions, such as, peptic ulcer even surgical interventions are no longer necessary. This results in the expansion of preventive and primary-care segments, with equal speed. Simultaneously, increasing complexity of many diseases, late stage disease detection, and better identification of rare diseases, are broadening the specialty hospital segment, as well.

On the other hand, the general mindset of people is also changing as fast. They dare to chart in the cyberspace, seek for more health-information, prefer participative care, expect a speedy treatment process – delivering better outcomes.

The cumulative impact of these are creating some brilliant sparks, confirming evolution of some disruptive health care business models. These are quite different from what we generally experience today.One such model is termed ‘connected healthcare.’ This is a unique business model, having potential to break the decades old status-quo – for the benefit of patients – closely involving doctors, pharma – medical device/diagnostic companies and of course the hospitals. In this article, I shall deliberate on ‘connected healthcare’ looking at its various aspects and examining whether pharma industry is ready for this change. Let me start this discussion with the role of Internet of Things (IoT), as an enabler for this process.

Internet of Things (IoT) – A great enabler for ‘connected health’:

‘Internet of Things (IoT)’ has opened new vistas of opportunities for providing healthcare with significantly better outcomes. According to Ecoconsultancy, by leveraging the IoT network, medical devices of everyday use can be made to collect, store and share invaluable medical data, providing a ‘connected healthcare’ system. Consequently, doctors, along with patients, can get speedy and deeper insights into symptoms and trends of diseases for prompt interventions, even from remote locations. The question that follows: what really is ‘connected health?’

‘Connected Health (cHealth)’ and a teething problem:

‘Connected health or (cHealth)’ refers to the process of empowering healthcare delivery through a system of connected and interrelated computing devices, mechanical and digital machines on an IoT network platform. It provides the ability for seamless data transfer and access between patients and providers, without requiring human-to-human interactions to improve both quality and outcomes of healthcare.

Two more articles, one titled ‘Connected health: How digital technology is transforming health and social care,’ and the other ‘Accelerating the adoption of connected health’, both published by Deloitte Center for Health Solutions also described ‘Connected health (cHealth)’quite eloquently.

One of the papers highlighted, being a technology driven network system, cHealth has its own teething problems. Some of its key reasons include: Many physicians ‘are often reluctant to engage with technology, partly due to the scale and pace of changes, and partly through lack of education and training, and concerns over liability and funding.’

Precise value offerings of a ‘Connected Health’ system:

The Accenture study titled, ‘Making the Case for Connected Health,’ established that ‘connected health’ approach creates value at three different levels, as follows:

  • Clinical efficacy and safety - Eliminating duplicate lab and radiology tests; improving patient safety through 24/7 access to comprehensive, legible medical records; and speeding up access to patient medical histories and vital information – the cost of treatment can be reduced, significantly.
  • Shared knowledge - Improves care quality, benefits with prompt safety alerts, such as drug interaction, enhances clinical decision-making through sophisticated tools along with evidence-based care protocols, and helps acquiring new capabilities in health care.
  • Care transformation - Advanced analytics help sharing clinical decision-making process, population health management, and facilitate building new care delivery models.

‘Connected health’ in managing chronic diseases:

‘Connected health’ is being practiced at different levels in many countries. These are particularly useful in treating or managing chronic ailments, such as cardiovascular (hypertension), metabolic (diabetes) disorders and COPD (Asthma).  Some examples are as follows:

Many hypertensive patients monitor their blood pressure and other related parameters, through self-operating digital instruments and devices. If the auto-flagged readings get transferred to the treating physicians through IoT system, physicians can promptly adjust the drug doses and offer other required advices over the same system online, and as and when required or periodically. This could avoid periodic personal visits to doctors for the similar purpose, saving time and money. At the same time, it ensures better quality of life through the desired level of disease management, always.

Similar results have been reported in the management of diabetes and Asthma with ‘connected health’ system.

 ‘Connected health’ in treating life-threatening diseases, like cancer:

The paper titled, ‘Smart technology helps improve outcomes for patients with head and neck cancer,’ published by the News Medical on May 17, 2018, which was also read at the June 2018 Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), highlights some interesting developments in this area. This federally funded, randomized clinical trial on 357 people receiving radiation for head and neck cancer, using mobile and sensor technology to remotely monitor patient symptoms, resulted in less severe symptoms related to both the cancer and its treatment.

It also noted: ‘Patients who used the technology – which included a Bluetooth-enabled weighing scale, Bluetooth-enabled blood pressure cuff, and mobile tablet with a symptom-tracking app that sent information directly to their physician each weekday – had lower symptom severity than participants who had standard weekly visits with their doctors. In addition, daily remote tracking of patient wellbeing, according to the researchers, enabled physicians to detect concerning symptoms early and respond more rapidly, compared to usual care.’

While treating serious ailments, medical images, such as computed axial tomography (CT), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), digital mammography and positron emission tomography (PET), can be connected, stored and shared with cloud-based connectivity and online sharing platforms, as confirmed by several studies. This would enable physicians to build better and deeper referral networks, for better diagnosis and speedier treatment inventions to patients.

‘Connected healthcare’ is fast growing:

As the above Accenture study indicates, many countries have started implementing  ‘connected healthcare’ systems to deliver cost-effective, high-quality and speedy healthcare services to the population with better outcomes. Some of these nations are, Australia, Canada, England, France, Germany, Singapore, Spain and the United States.

According to the New Market Research report titled, “Connected Healthcare Market – Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Trends, Growth and Forecast 2018 – 2022,” published by Wise Guy Research: ‘Globally, Asia-Pacific region is one of the fastest growing markets for ‘connected healthcare’. It was valued at USD 2.65 billion in 2015, and is expected to reach USD 23.8 billion by 2022, at the rate of 30.6% during the forecast period.’ During this span, ‘The global connected healthcare market is expected to reach $105,337.5 Million by 2022 at a CAGR of 30.27%,’ with North America commanding largest market share of 36.7%, the report highlights.

‘Connected health’ shows a high potential in India:

The above report also indicates, ‘mobile-health services’ accounts for the largest market segment in the UK, Italy, Japan, China and India. E-prescribing is the fastest growing segment in Asia Pacific and is expected to grow at the rate of 31.27% CAGR during the forecast-period.

E-Health initiative of the Government of India, which is aimed at using of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in health signals a good potential for ‘connected health’ in India. Fast penetration of mobile technologies even at the hinterland of India will facilitate this process.

Another article titled, ‘Why Connected health is the key to reducing waste and increasing efficiency,’ published in Healthcare India on July 25, 2017, brings to the fore some key benefits of ‘connected healthcare’ in the country. It says, ‘connected healthcare’, can bring path-breaking changes in the country. Following are a few examples:

  • Today when almost 70 percent of the medical expenses are borne by the patient, a ‘connected health’ ecosystem, would reduce admissions by early intervention and potentially deter surgeries.
  • Having access to a patient’s entire medical record, physicians’ will be able to minimize ‘over diagnosis’, amounting to multiple tests, over-medication and avoidable prescriptions, thereby reducing out of pocket health expenditure of patients.
  • When patients are referred from one doctor to the other, or from the rural medical centers to district hospitals, they often need to repeat all the tests, as there is no connected health ecosystem. In doing so, they lose time and sometimes don’t show up for follow up treatments and consultations with their treatment remains incomplete.

Leading private players in ‘connected health’ area:

Some of the leading market players in the global ‘connected healthcare’ market, reportedly, include Agamatrix Inc. (USA), Airstrips Technology (San Antonio), AliveCore Inc. (Australia), Apple Inc. (USA), Athenahealth Inc. (USA), Boston Scientific Co. (USA), GE Healthcare (UK), Honeywell Life care Solutions (UK), Medtronics (Ireland) and Philips Innovation Campus (Bengaluru, India).

Would ‘Connected healthcare’ disrupt pharma’s legacy commercial model:

McKinsey Digital’s March 2012 paper titled, “Biopharma in the coming era of connected health” explains, how ‘connected healthcare’ has started disrupting the legacy commercial models of pharma and Biopharma industry. One of the related examples cited in the article is, pharma’s less emphasis on large sales forces “selling” to physicians.

As this new system gathers wind on its sail, information transparency will allow customers, regulators, and competitors to understand and independently assess the performance of various drugs, often better than what the manufacturers present. These powerful new data sources would reveal true efficacy of medicines, in the real-world settings. No doubt, it will be a significant patient empowerment.

Would pharma be caught off-guard?

Despite such clear signs of changes, the way the pharma industry continues to operate, which as perceived by a majority of the population, is generally self-serving in nature. It has remained virtually unchanged over several decades. Another strong public perception is, patients often get trapped by a two-way financial interest, existing between doctors, hospitals, pharma, biotech – medical devices/diagnostic companies, in various forms. Notwithstanding, industry lobbyists pooh-poohing it, it remains a robust general perception, nonetheless.

That said, this situation can no longer be allowed to remain frozen in time. Today, time is making many things obsolete, including human behavior and business practices, much faster than ever before. This gets fueled primarily by two catalytic factors – one, rapid progress of technology, and the other, which is even more fundamental – the changing demographic profile and social fabric. Together, these are creating a new, informed, more assertive and expressive mindset of people – signaling their needs, preferred choices and processes, even for a health care solution. It’s for the industry now to shape up, soon.

Conclusion:

Joining all these dots, one gets a clear sign of ‘connected healthcare’ gradually evolving in India. Even if, it still takes some more time for an integrated ICT system to be in place, especially in India, it’s for sure that ‘connected healthcare’ will be a reality, surely.

As and when it happens, it will be a disruptive process. The process of sharing all requisite disease prevention, treatment and management related data, between patients, doctors and other care providers, including pharma companies – over regulatory approved, interconnected IoT enabled devices, machines and applications, will benefit all.

There will, of course, be several barriers to overcome, before this new era ushers in. One such hurdle being, many doctors still don’t express a favorable attitude towards adoption of ICT technology in their everyday practice. Alongside, the government with the help of regulators, should enact the requisite laws, and frame stringent rules to ensure enough privacy and security of confidential medical information of individual patients. In tandem, appropriate authorities must ensure that ‘connected healthcare’ system is effectively implemented by all concerned.

As strong environmental needs will hasten this process, public access to high quality healthcare with better outcomes – and all at an affordable cost, will improve by manifold. Thus, I reckon, days aren’t too far to witness ‘connected health care’ in India. But, the hundred-dollar questions still remain unanswered – Are most pharma players ready for the ‘connected healthcare’ regime, or will it catch them off-guard?

By: Tapan J. Ray   

Disclaimer: The views/opinions expressed in this article are entirely my own, written in my individual and personal capacity. I do not represent any other person or organization for this opinion.

A New Pharma Marketing Combo Places Patients At The Center Of Business

As discussed in several of my previous articles, most pharma players need to walk the talk on ‘patient-centricity’, coming out of prevailing high decibel lip-service. This is not an easy task, and far from being every company’s cup of tea.

Effective implementation of patient-centricity by an organization, entails understanding of behavioral science by today’s pharma marketers. Many of them, I am sure, have already studied it in Business Schools. Be that as it may, by harnessing this scientific knowledge, the insights that they will acquire on primary and secondary pharma customers, will be unique. The important cues that will come out of the insights, will help them create well- targeted strategic marketing game plans having a cutting-edge. When implemented on an ongoing basis, this will help catalyze a win-win business environment, for reaping a rich harvest over a long period of time.

In today’s article, I shall dwell on the increasing relevance of an interesting combo of behavioral science – predictive analytics and patient-centricity, for a sustainable business performance. This is especially for the millennial pharma marketers to try and implement. With blessings from the top management, this model will help them jettison – the increasingly counterproductive – ‘gratification model’ of pharma business, imbibing ‘patient-centric ones’ – that patients themselves can feel and will appreciate.

The basic requirements to make it happen:

The basic requirements of the pharma companies to make it happen is to gradually move away from its core strategy of ‘buying prescriptions’ that often happens through contentious means. No doubt, it has the power to create a temporary strong brand push. But is definitely not sustainable, as these usually go against patients’ health and economic interest.

For a sustainable demand for a pharma brand, pharma companies would need to design a strong ‘brand pull’ in the new paradigm. This would prompt drug companies acquiring deep insights on how to leave a cherishing treatment experience with the patients for the brand. This would, consequently, have a strong-positive rub-off effect on the corporate image, as well. Likewise, a doctor would also like to know, how to create similar patient-experience with his treatment, to draw more of them in the future. This is diametrically opposite to generation of demand for a brand through ‘payment to doctors for prescriptions.’

Pharma marketer’s understanding of behavioral science is necessary:

This is because, it helps to get targeted deep-stick studies done on the way pharma customers, such as doctors and patients, behave. The span of the behavioral study should commence from the onset of a patient’s search for a disease treatment process, right up to when the individual gets an ‘after treatment experience’ – good, bad or average. It is, therefore, necessary for a drug company, to become more patient-centric, rather than self-serving, for achieving the desired goals of pharma business, consistently.

This wisdom would enable pharma marketers developing the following five broad insights for being ‘patient-centric’:

  • Understanding the process of thinking of a type or a group of patients about making their treatment choices. It could often mean not going for any treatment at all, or not adhering to prescribed treatment.
  • What makes patients behave the way they do, while undergoing a treatment?
  • Understanding both mental and physical feelings of patients while suffering from certain disease conditions, for effective engagement with them.
  • What type of holistic treatment experience the patients would value most to cherish.
  • What type of treatment experience the doctors would value most to provide to patients to enhance their practice and professional reputation.

While doing so, pharma marketers would need to clearly harmonize the two areas – one pertaining to doctors, and the other involving patients. This is important for the purpose of a clear focus on a comprehensive brand strategy formulation, based on well-analyzed data.

The key point to note, however – a creative blend of behavioral science with new-age pharma marketing tools can bring a sea change in the business performance of a company, along with providing a delightful treatment experience to patients with its drugs.

Generation of a huge pool of customer behavioral data is the starting point:

The first step of making a patient-centric organization is the generation of a huge pool of data on customer-behavior dynamics. That said, making predictions on the company’s customer behavior for future outcomes of the brand performance, from this data pool, would involve the use data analytics, which for this purpose will be ‘predictive data analytics.’

The use of ‘predictive analytics’ in pharma marketing:

In my article titled, ‘Data: The New Magic Wand For Pharma Business Excellence’, published in this Blog on October 01, 2018, I discussed the importance of well targeted data-based decision-making process, across the pharma functional areas. Taking this idea forward, let me explain here the critical role that ‘predictive data analytics’ can play in acquiring insights of the trend of behavior of the customers, especially patients and doctors.

Simply put, ‘predictive analytics’ is a type of advanced analytics, which are used to get deep insights and making well-informed predictions, based on both past and current data feeds. In pharma, especially for the subject that I am discussing, it pertains to insights on doctor and patient behavior related predictions, encompassing the entire span of a disease treatment process. Skillfully executed, this will strengthen, at least, two critical success factors in the pharma business:

  • Acquiring predictable insights on the targeted customers’ behavioral trend and pattern any given time-frame.
  • With such customer insights making the organization ‘patient-centric’ for more effective engagement with its customers.

Combining the above two points, I can well say, by analyzing a huge pool of data from behavioral-science-based information – ‘predictive analytics’ helps acquire deep insights on predictable customer behavior, with high precision. These are so useful, not just for better engagement with doctors, patients and other stakeholders, but also in making the organization patient-centric, in true sense. Nevertheless, many still question - Is ‘patients centricity’ really feasible in the pharma industry?

Is ‘patient centricity’ really feasible in the pharma industry?

This question was also raised in the 2017 paper titled, “Patient Centricity and Pharmaceutical Companies: Is It Feasible?” -  published in Vol. 51(4) of the Therapeutic Innovation & Regulatory Science (TIRS). The paper captures patient-centricity as integrated measures for listening to and partnering with patients, and placing patients’ well-being at the core of all business initiatives. It represents a holistic approach to the disease management process.

The concept brand-oriented patient-centricity is not too difficult to understand. But, I reckon, the difficulty lies somewhere else. It is to fathom where and how a pharma player can predictably add differentiating value, for those patients who need a right kind of treatment. That’s why, the question of feasibility of ‘patient-centricity’ is being raised.

There is no doubt that such an effort presupposes considerable insights on patients’ behavior, alongside the requisite expertise to predict these, for different time-frames, with a great degree of precision. This not an insurmountable task, either, particularly in today’s paradigm – with state-of-the-art ‘predictive data analytic’ tools. This prompts me to believe, it is very much possible to make a truly patient centric organization, assuming that there will exist a strong will to survive in the business and prosper!

Are ‘predictive data analytics’ different from other analytics?

Yes, the following two key points make ‘predictive data analytics’ quite different from other data analytics:

  • General data analytics usually help acquire insights on the past and present.
  • Whereas, predictive data analytics help looking at near-mid and long-term future, regarding most probable customer behavior pattern and trend, with great accuracy.

Currently, with the ability to generate relevant and real-time big data pool, together with application of machine learning, data-mining and statistical modelling – predictive analytics have the power to help acquire future insights. This insight is totally data-based, sans any gut-feel. Thus, effective use of this process can enable pharma players effectively predict trends and behaviors of doctors and patients for meaningful engagement with them for their chosen brands.

Has potential to create a win-win outcome: 

To ensure a game-changing payback from this process, crafty dovetailing of the following three steps, complementing each other is critical:

  • Generate a huge pool of real-time data on doctors’ and patients’ behavior pattern, for a pre-selected time-frame.
  • With the knowledge of behavioral science, help analyze them with predictive analytics.
  • Understand from the results, the trend of behavioral dynamics of selected customers from the brand perspective.
  • Frame rewarding business strategies to create a win-win situation, involving both – the pharma players and the patients.

Some pharma players are on the ball:

One of the key reasons for imbibing patient-centricity, is the proliferation of ‘me-too’ types of brands – both patented and generics. It has started happening even in the market of high-priced oncology medicines, with not much difference in price between them.

In this situation, predictive data analytic tools can help understand multi-variable relationship between patient’s needs, their interaction with physicians, the oncologist’s prescriptions to them, type of physician-engagement of drug companies and patients’ experience before, during and after the treatment. This is not an easy task, nor all pharma companies have wherewithal of doing this, to gain brand market share, significantly.

With predictive data analytics, many pharma companies are keeping eyes on the ball, using it in different business areas, such as drug discovery. But not many of them, are using this combo-approach to make a patient-centric pharma organization. It is just a matter of time, I reckon, that global pharma will decide to move in this direction – fortified with deep pockets, but with a battered reputation, and facing a hostile pricing environment, across the world.    

Conclusion:

Customer insights, acquired through the crafty application of behavioral science, have immense potential to make sales and marketing decisions more informed, than what it is today. In tandem, it will help create a ‘worth remembering’ treatment experience for the patients with the brand used.

From this perspective, I reckon, skillful application of behavioral science to generate a huge pool of data, and their analysis with ‘predictive analytics’ will go a long way to create a truly ‘patient-centric’ organization.

When executed by a well-integrated expert team of market research, medical affairs and pharma marketing professionals, this new marketing-combo-approach has the potential to fetch a game-changing performance outcome, placing patients at the center of business. The net gain to the organization will be much more than the sum total of what each of these steps can ensue individually – remarkably enhancing corporate reputation, in tandem.

By: Tapan J. Ray     

Disclaimer: The views/opinions expressed in this article are entirely my own, written in my individual and personal capacity. I do not represent any other person or organization for this opinion.