"I love THE BUSINESS OF BIOTECHNOLOGY"

2022-10-06 10:28:48

0 Skip to Content THE BUSINESS OF BIOTECHNOLOGY Home The Book Antibodies The Biotech Entrepreneur Biotech-Pharma Alliances Authors Contact “A fascinating guide to the complex business of biotechnology, with deep insights into the key factors, players, interactions and behaviours that have shaped the success of this industry. Suitable as a primer for those with no knowledge of the field, or as a refresher for the cognoscenti. Trigger warning: contains material that may distress pharma management.”- Sir Gregory Winter, CBE, recipient of the 2018 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, and founder of several biotech companies “A must read for all biotechnology leaders, this is a state-of-the-art analysis of the industry from two of its most successful entrepreneurs and a top business school professor, bringing rigor and actionable insight.”- Dr Richard Mason, CEO of Apollo Therapeutics and former head of Johnson & Johnson’s London Innovation Center “This is a remarkable synthesis and analysis of the Biotech industry from the viewpoint of individuals who thoroughly understand it based on their own seminal achievements. Their analysis of the key components is a must-read for those either trying to develop new life-saving medicines or interested in furthering these enterprises.” - Margaret A. Liu, M.D., DSchc, MDhc, FISV, CEO of Pax Therapeutics, and board member, Ipsen, S.A. “Anyone who wants to understand how to leverage ecosystems for innovation in the face of uncertainty must read this rigorous analysis of how biotech companies, investors, government and big pharma have worked together to achieve some of the biggest scientific and commercial breakthroughs of the last century.”- Arnoud De Meyer, Professor Emeritus and former President, Singapore Management University "A must read for everybody interested in the medical biotech industry, practically relevant and theoretically sound."- Jürgen Mihm, Professor of Technology and Operations Management at INSEAD “How is it possible that a few thousand small companies, many of them short-lived, can out-compete the mighty pharma majors at their own game? Understanding this puzzle is of fundamental importance for industry leaders and policy makers alike. This marvelous insider analysis is a must-read.”- Stefan Scholtes, Dennis Gillings Professor of Health Management, Cambridge University Centre for Health Leadership & Enterprise “An outstanding overview of the science and the business of innovative drugs. Students, researchers and policy makers will be immensely benefited from this book.”- Mahmud Hassan, Ph.D, Director, The Blanche and Irwin Lerner Center for the Study of Pharmaceutical Management Issues Rutgers Business School, Newark and New Brunswick “[A]n insightful view into the inner workings of the industry and the characteristics of biotechnology firms vs those of traditional pharmaceutical companies. The authors provide thoughtful and thorough analysis of the biotech ecosystem, which includes academic researchers, investors and other funders, contract research and manufacturing organizations, and corporate partners. - Janice Reichert, PhD, Executive Director, The Antibody Society “Fascinating and Easy To Read.”- Scott, 5 Star Amazon Review Excerpts from the Book How Have Monoclonal Antibodies Transformed Medicine? “Monoclonal antibody” may be a new phrase to many, but these clever disease targeting biologics have been part of medical treatments for decades. In fact, our research shows that monoclonal antibodies comprise the vast majority of FDA approved biologics to date, with sales of $157.3 billion in 2018. Read More Do You Have the Skills to Succeed as a Biotech Entrepreneur? We have developed a set of questions to help people consider whether they might find a career in biotechnology entrepreneurship fulfilling and a good match for their personality and inclinations. Find Out Did You Know that Biotech-Pharma Alliances are More Effective When the Biotech Company has Control? Research demonstrates that alliances are less likely to lead to an FDA-approved drug when the pharma company retains more control of the partnership. Learn More EXCERPTHow GSK Missed a $50 Billion Opportunity with the COVID-19 Vaccine At the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic, scientists around the world set out to design an effective vaccine as rapidly as possible. No one knew what technological approach would be the most successful. The goal was to prompt vaccinated people’s bodies to generate a strong immune response to an essential part of the virus called the “spike protein.” Then, upon exposure to the virus, the immune response would neutralize or eliminate it before the infection could set in. The key question was how to get the spike protein in the body in a way that would lead to a rapid and effective immune response.No one was better positioned to answer that question than GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), the world’s leader in vaccines. With over $8 billion in vaccine sales, GSK had opened a dedicated global vaccines research center just a few years before. In those new labs, GSK researchers had been working with a promising new vaccine technology called mRNA. With that approach, they could potentially deliver the genetic code for the spike protein directly to the patients’ cells. To get the resources to work on an mRNA-based COVID vaccine, the researchers, following the standard approach common to many pharmaceutical companies, presented the idea to the series of GSK committees that needed to approve research programs. After the proposal finally found its way to senior management, it was rejected on the grounds that mRNA technology was not “ready for prime time.” “The biotech industry has been able to create more high priority, pathbreaking medicines with less experience and far fewer resources than the pharmaceutical industry.” At the same time, two small biotech companies set out to design mRNA COVID vaccines. Later recounting that it took one of them an afternoon, and the other just two days, the biotech companies pressed forward with the unproven technology. One of them, Moderna, developed the product on its own, while the other, BioNTech, partnered its vaccine with Pfizer for on-going development.Eventually, the Moderna and BioNTech/Pfizer vaccines were authorized for sale in many countries, and became the leading COVID vaccines. Analysts projected total 2021 sales of over $13 billion for the Moderna vaccine, and over $19 billion for the BioNTech/Pfizer vaccine. Their willingness to bet on an unproven, potentially not-ready-for-prime-time technology propelled them well past GSK, which would no longer be the #1 vaccine company.This story illustrates many of the themes of chapter 7. Biotech and pharmaceutical companies frequently have access to the same technologies and are working on the same diseases. But there are very significant differences in how decisions are made to allocate resources to the various research programs, leading to different levels of tolerance for risk. Those differences can help explain why the biotech industry has been able to create more high priority, pathbreaking medicines with less experience and far fewer resources than the pharmaceutical industry.Read More Great Content from The Business of BiotechnologyThis is an article that has been published by Oxford University Press in the book From Breakthrough to Blockbuster: The Business of Biotechnology by Donald Drakeman, Lisa Drakeman, and Nektarios Oraiopoulos, published February 14, 2022. © 2021-2022 Donald Drakeman, Lisa Drakeman, Nektarios OraiopoulosDesigned and Built by CDrakeman