Typically most pharmaceutical companies plough back profits from their blockbuster drugs into R&D. Now they are under tremendous pressure to launch more blockbuster drugs to support the rising R&D expenditure. In addition, falling new molecular entity (NME) approvals is forcing companies to boost research productivity. But the research pipelines of many companies are too weak to fill this vacuum. The dearth of blockbuster drugs is one of the reasons behind the recent wave of mergers and acquisitions.
Twenty-five years ago, in the early days of biotech innovation, most people thought of biotechnology and big pharmaceutical companies as polar opposites, never likely to share research, office space, or management. Today, biotech and "big pharma" companies are looking more alike, behaving more alike, and sharing more resources. In fact, in many cases, it is becoming difficult to tell them apart.
Big pharmaceutical companies have generally focused on basic chemistry approaches to product development, while biotech companies have more often focused on emerging molecular biology/genetic engineering approaches. In recent years, this dichotomy has eroded and both biotech companies and Pharma companies are exploring emerging gene-based approaches, with Pharmas entering the field in part through the acquisition of and collaboration with genomics companies. More significantly, Pharma companies are beginning to set up their own genomics units and decentralize their research and development operations in an effort to emulate the perceived research prowess of biotech companies (e.g., Pfizer, Glaxo-SmithKline, and Johnson & Johnson are said to have reorganized research and development operations into smaller units that focus more exclusively on research). |
