Beyond the pill
超越药品
Drugs firms are casting about for new business models
制药企业正在铸造新的商业模式
“THE future is not terribly bright for most drug companies,” says a new report from Sanford Bernstein, a respected New York investment firm. Such blunt talk is unusual on Wall Street, but it is no exaggeration. Drugs firms, once rich and the favourites of investors, are urgently seeking cures to a variety of ailments.
“大多数制药企业的前景都不是十分光明。” 一份来自Sanford Bernstein（桑佛·伯恩斯坦）公司（一家在纽约的知名投资公司）的新的分析报告中这样说。这样直言不讳的说法在华尔街不常听到，但是这并不是危言耸听。曾经是投资者最爱的那些富有的制药企业，正在急切地寻找着治疗自身各种疾病的办法。
One is the erosion of patent protection. Not only are the copy-cat manufacturers of cheaper generic drugs becoming emboldened by cost-conscious politicians and legal rulings in their favour, but big pharmaceutical companies are also facing an unprecedented wave of patent expirations over the next five years. Pfizer alone will lose some $13 billion in revenue a year when Lipitor, its blockbuster cholesterol
drug, goes off-patent as early as 2010.
困绕制药企业的第一个问题是专利保护的丧失。不仅由于那些生产廉价仿制药的制造商在那些关注成本的政治家和那些对他们有利的法律判决地关爱下变得更加大胆；而且大型制药企业在未来五年也要面对一波前所未有的产品专利到期的浪潮。仅辉瑞一家因为Lipitor（阿托伐他汀钙，辉瑞的拳头产品，用于治疗胆固醇，2010年专利到期）的专利到期一年的损失就达130亿美元左右，
The industry's best hope lies in innovation, its traditional strength. But it is finding it extremely difficult to come up with new blockbusters. As the Bernstein report notes, the global industry saw 24 new drugs approved by the US Food and Drug Administration in 1998 on the back of $27 billion spent on R&D. Last year, the industry spent $64 billion, but only 13 new drugs were approved by the regulator.
这个产业最大的希望寄托在创新上，这也是它的传统强项，但是现在推出新的重磅炸弹产品变得非常困难。伯恩斯坦公司的报告显示1998年全球制药产业的研发总投入是270亿美元，这一年获得FDA批准的新药的数量是24个。去年制药行业在研发方面的投入达到了640亿美元，但是只有13种新药获得批准。
And even new drugs can no longer reliably command the huge premiums they once did. Peter Lawyer, of the Boston Consulting Group, reckons the global drugs market doubled in value to $600 billion in revenues in the decade to 2005, chiefly from growth in America. But there is little chance it will double again by 2015, he argues. If America were to adopt European-style controls on drugs prices, as some Democratic presidential candidates are proposing, half of the industry's profits would disappear.
而且即使是新药也很难像原来那样为公司带来巨大的利润。波士顿咨询集团的Peter Lawyer先生认为全球制药市场在从1995到2005的10年间增长了1倍，达到了6000亿美元（增长主要来自美国市场）但是到2015年再增长1倍的可能性微乎其微。如果美国像一些民主党的总统候选人正在建议的那样采用欧洲的方式对药品价格进行管制，这个产业一半的利润就会消失掉。
Drugs are also being pulled from the market. Usually this is for safety reasons, such as those which last year forced Pfizer to kill torcetrapib, an experimental cholesterol drug, after spending $1 billion on it. Traditionally, drugs firms did not yank products that were safe even if they sold poorly. But now that has changed. Jeffrey Kindler, Pfizer's boss, decided to wield the axe as part of his drive to reduce costs and last week pulled Exubera, an inhaled insulin product, off the market. For this, Pfizer took a $2.8 billion charge.
一些已经上市销售的药品却又不得不被召回。一般情况下是由于安全的原因，例如去年辉瑞在花费10亿美元后被迫放弃了torcetrapib，一个处于实验中的抗胆固醇的药物。过去，制药企业不会召回没有安全问题的产品，即使它们的销售业绩很差。但是现在这种情况改变了，上周辉瑞的老板Jeffrey Kindler决定挥起削减成本的板斧砍掉Exubera（一种吸入式胰岛素产品），为此辉瑞已经花费28亿美元。
So what can Big Pharma do? Mr Lawyer thinks the deterioration in the American market will force drugs firms to come up with new business models that go beyond the industry's traditional and largely vertically integrated approach to developing, manufacturing and selling drugs. A sign of this happening is a recent move towards outsourcing. When times were good, drugs firms refused to outsource manufacturing because doing so, they argued, would result in quality problems and
risk giving away trade secrets. That strategy is being rethought. AstraZeneca, a big British drugs firm, recently announced that it will start shifting manufacturing operations to Asia as part of a cost-cuttingdrive.
如此说来大型制药公司应当怎样做呢？Lawyer先生认为美国市场的衰退迫使制药企业放弃这个产业传统的垂直一体化的发展方法（即研发、生产和销售都集中在一个企业内部）去寻求新的商业模式。证明这种趋势的一个事件是外包的流行。当市场形势好的时候，制药企业拒绝生产外包因为它们认为这样做会有出现质量问题和泄露商业秘密的风险。但是现在这种策略被重新提起。阿斯利康（一家英国的大型制药公司）最近宣布作为削减成本的手段之一，它开始将生产转移到亚洲。
Firms are not only changing how they make drugs, but how they market them—especially in America. On one estimate, big drugs firms spend less than a fifth of their revenues in America on R&D, but over a third peddling pills. Raymond Hill, of IMS Health, a consultancy, says that firms too often “differentiate pills using sales reps” rather than by superior innovation. That, he says, needs to be reversed. Bosses of drugs firms now publicly acknowledge the problem. Daniel Vasella, chairman of Novartis, a Swiss drugs giant, agrees that his industry must innovate or risk falling into a low-margin ghetto of commodity pricing. Last week he announced a shake-up to help Novartis do so. “We must rethink all assumptions, from innovation to marketing to sales and promotion,” he says. To hedge risks in prescription drugs, Dr Vasella wants to grow his firm's generics division, as well as increase its presence in diagnostics, non-prescription drugs and biotechnology. Novartis recently decided to launch a generic version of Epo, a popular drug pioneered by Amgen, an American biotechnology firm,in Europe—the sort of cheeky move usually seen only from generics firms.
制药企业不仅要改变生产药品的方式，而且要改变销售药品的方式—特别是在美国。据估计美国大型制药企业用于研发的投入一般不到其收入的1/3，而其1/3以上的收入却用于产品的推销。IMS Health公司（一家知名的美医药市场咨询调研公司）的Raymond Hill先生说许多公司主要依靠销售代表来使自己的药品与众不同而不是依靠出众的创新实力，他说这种情况应当翻转过来。一些制药公司的老板现在也公开承认这个问题。Novartis（诺华，瑞士制药巨头）的主席Daniel Vasella赞同他的产业必须创新否则将有坠入低利润区的风险。上周他宣布要通过一次革新运动来振兴诺华。他说“我们必须重新思考所有假设从研发到市场到销售到促销。”为了限制处方药的风险，Vasella博士准备发展他们公司的仿制药部门，同时增加诊断设备、非处方药和生物制药的比重。诺华近期准备在欧洲上市Epo（促红细胞生成素）的仿制药，这种药是美国生物科技公司Amgen原研的，这种仿制别人药品的“厚颜无耻”的行为原来只有仿制药公司才做。
Lots of big drugs firms are moving into biotechnology to fill their product pipelines. Earlier this year AstraZeneca bought MedImmune, an American biotechnology firm, for about $16 billion. A takeover battle may soon erupt over Biogen Idec, another large American biotech firm. Roche, another Swiss firm, has made a hostile bid for Ventana, a medical-diagnostics company in Arizona,and other firms are moving in on makers of medical devices and non-prescription drugs. Terry Hisey of
Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu argues in a new report that such deals go beyond hedging risks in their traditional businesses: he reckons it heralds a dramatic new “convergence of drugs, devices and diagnostics” which could lead to innovation and new opportunities for growth. If he is right it would be good news indeed for an industry sorely in need of rejuvenation.
许多大型制药公司为了扩张它们的产品线正在向生物技术进军。今年早些时候AstraZeneca（阿斯利康）用大约160亿美元收购了MedImmune（一家美国生物技术公司）。有关Biogen Idec（另一家美国大型生物技术公司）的一场收购战也即将打响。另一家瑞士制药公司Roche（罗氏）对Ventana（一家在亚利桑那州的医学诊断公司）和另一家生产医学设备和非处方药的公司发起了一场敌意收购，Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu（德勤全球）的Terry Hisey先生在一份新的报告里认为这些事情已经超出了传统的限制风险的措施的范围，他认为这预示着一个戏剧性新闻的出现：“集药品、设备和诊断于一体”的制药企业的出现，这可能会导致创新和新的增长机会。如果他的判断是正确的那对急需恢复活力的制药行业确实是个好消息。
我的博客:http://blog.tom.com/jl917921
超越药品
Drugs firms are casting about for new business models
制药企业正在铸造新的商业模式
“THE future is not terribly bright for most drug companies,” says a new report from Sanford Bernstein, a respected New York investment firm. Such blunt talk is unusual on Wall Street, but it is no exaggeration. Drugs firms, once rich and the favourites of investors, are urgently seeking cures to a variety of ailments.
“大多数制药企业的前景都不是十分光明。” 一份来自Sanford Bernstein（桑佛·伯恩斯坦）公司（一家在纽约的知名投资公司）的新的分析报告中这样说。这样直言不讳的说法在华尔街不常听到，但是这并不是危言耸听。曾经是投资者最爱的那些富有的制药企业，正在急切地寻找着治疗自身各种疾病的办法。
One is the erosion of patent protection. Not only are the copy-cat manufacturers of cheaper generic drugs becoming emboldened by cost-conscious politicians and legal rulings in their favour, but big pharmaceutical companies are also facing an unprecedented wave of patent expirations over the next five years. Pfizer alone will lose some $13 billion in revenue a year when Lipitor, its blockbuster cholesterol
drug, goes off-patent as early as 2010.
困绕制药企业的第一个问题是专利保护的丧失。不仅由于那些生产廉价仿制药的制造商在那些关注成本的政治家和那些对他们有利的法律判决地关爱下变得更加大胆；而且大型制药企业在未来五年也要面对一波前所未有的产品专利到期的浪潮。仅辉瑞一家因为Lipitor（阿托伐他汀钙，辉瑞的拳头产品，用于治疗胆固醇，2010年专利到期）的专利到期一年的损失就达130亿美元左右，
The industry's best hope lies in innovation, its traditional strength. But it is finding it extremely difficult to come up with new blockbusters. As the Bernstein report notes, the global industry saw 24 new drugs approved by the US Food and Drug Administration in 1998 on the back of $27 billion spent on R&D. Last year, the industry spent $64 billion, but only 13 new drugs were approved by the regulator.
这个产业最大的希望寄托在创新上，这也是它的传统强项，但是现在推出新的重磅炸弹产品变得非常困难。伯恩斯坦公司的报告显示1998年全球制药产业的研发总投入是270亿美元，这一年获得FDA批准的新药的数量是24个。去年制药行业在研发方面的投入达到了640亿美元，但是只有13种新药获得批准。
And even new drugs can no longer reliably command the huge premiums they once did. Peter Lawyer, of the Boston Consulting Group, reckons the global drugs market doubled in value to $600 billion in revenues in the decade to 2005, chiefly from growth in America. But there is little chance it will double again by 2015, he argues. If America were to adopt European-style controls on drugs prices, as some Democratic presidential candidates are proposing, half of the industry's profits would disappear.
而且即使是新药也很难像原来那样为公司带来巨大的利润。波士顿咨询集团的Peter Lawyer先生认为全球制药市场在从1995到2005的10年间增长了1倍，达到了6000亿美元（增长主要来自美国市场）但是到2015年再增长1倍的可能性微乎其微。如果美国像一些民主党的总统候选人正在建议的那样采用欧洲的方式对药品价格进行管制，这个产业一半的利润就会消失掉。
Drugs are also being pulled from the market. Usually this is for safety reasons, such as those which last year forced Pfizer to kill torcetrapib, an experimental cholesterol drug, after spending $1 billion on it. Traditionally, drugs firms did not yank products that were safe even if they sold poorly. But now that has changed. Jeffrey Kindler, Pfizer's boss, decided to wield the axe as part of his drive to reduce costs and last week pulled Exubera, an inhaled insulin product, off the market. For this, Pfizer took a $2.8 billion charge.
一些已经上市销售的药品却又不得不被召回。一般情况下是由于安全的原因，例如去年辉瑞在花费10亿美元后被迫放弃了torcetrapib，一个处于实验中的抗胆固醇的药物。过去，制药企业不会召回没有安全问题的产品，即使它们的销售业绩很差。但是现在这种情况改变了，上周辉瑞的老板Jeffrey Kindler决定挥起削减成本的板斧砍掉Exubera（一种吸入式胰岛素产品），为此辉瑞已经花费28亿美元。
So what can Big Pharma do? Mr Lawyer thinks the deterioration in the American market will force drugs firms to come up with new business models that go beyond the industry's traditional and largely vertically integrated approach to developing, manufacturing and selling drugs. A sign of this happening is a recent move towards outsourcing. When times were good, drugs firms refused to outsource manufacturing because doing so, they argued, would result in quality problems and
risk giving away trade secrets. That strategy is being rethought. AstraZeneca, a big British drugs firm, recently announced that it will start shifting manufacturing operations to Asia as part of a cost-cuttingdrive.
如此说来大型制药公司应当怎样做呢？Lawyer先生认为美国市场的衰退迫使制药企业放弃这个产业传统的垂直一体化的发展方法（即研发、生产和销售都集中在一个企业内部）去寻求新的商业模式。证明这种趋势的一个事件是外包的流行。当市场形势好的时候，制药企业拒绝生产外包因为它们认为这样做会有出现质量问题和泄露商业秘密的风险。但是现在这种策略被重新提起。阿斯利康（一家英国的大型制药公司）最近宣布作为削减成本的手段之一，它开始将生产转移到亚洲。
Firms are not only changing how they make drugs, but how they market them—especially in America. On one estimate, big drugs firms spend less than a fifth of their revenues in America on R&D, but over a third peddling pills. Raymond Hill, of IMS Health, a consultancy, says that firms too often “differentiate pills using sales reps” rather than by superior innovation. That, he says, needs to be reversed. Bosses of drugs firms now publicly acknowledge the problem. Daniel Vasella, chairman of Novartis, a Swiss drugs giant, agrees that his industry must innovate or risk falling into a low-margin ghetto of commodity pricing. Last week he announced a shake-up to help Novartis do so. “We must rethink all assumptions, from innovation to marketing to sales and promotion,” he says. To hedge risks in prescription drugs, Dr Vasella wants to grow his firm's generics division, as well as increase its presence in diagnostics, non-prescription drugs and biotechnology. Novartis recently decided to launch a generic version of Epo, a popular drug pioneered by Amgen, an American biotechnology firm,in Europe—the sort of cheeky move usually seen only from generics firms.
制药企业不仅要改变生产药品的方式，而且要改变销售药品的方式—特别是在美国。据估计美国大型制药企业用于研发的投入一般不到其收入的1/3，而其1/3以上的收入却用于产品的推销。IMS Health公司（一家知名的美医药市场咨询调研公司）的Raymond Hill先生说许多公司主要依靠销售代表来使自己的药品与众不同而不是依靠出众的创新实力，他说这种情况应当翻转过来。一些制药公司的老板现在也公开承认这个问题。Novartis（诺华，瑞士制药巨头）的主席Daniel Vasella赞同他的产业必须创新否则将有坠入低利润区的风险。上周他宣布要通过一次革新运动来振兴诺华。他说“我们必须重新思考所有假设从研发到市场到销售到促销。”为了限制处方药的风险，Vasella博士准备发展他们公司的仿制药部门，同时增加诊断设备、非处方药和生物制药的比重。诺华近期准备在欧洲上市Epo（促红细胞生成素）的仿制药，这种药是美国生物科技公司Amgen原研的，这种仿制别人药品的“厚颜无耻”的行为原来只有仿制药公司才做。
Lots of big drugs firms are moving into biotechnology to fill their product pipelines. Earlier this year AstraZeneca bought MedImmune, an American biotechnology firm, for about $16 billion. A takeover battle may soon erupt over Biogen Idec, another large American biotech firm. Roche, another Swiss firm, has made a hostile bid for Ventana, a medical-diagnostics company in Arizona,and other firms are moving in on makers of medical devices and non-prescription drugs. Terry Hisey of
Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu argues in a new report that such deals go beyond hedging risks in their traditional businesses: he reckons it heralds a dramatic new “convergence of drugs, devices and diagnostics” which could lead to innovation and new opportunities for growth. If he is right it would be good news indeed for an industry sorely in need of rejuvenation.
许多大型制药公司为了扩张它们的产品线正在向生物技术进军。今年早些时候AstraZeneca（阿斯利康）用大约160亿美元收购了MedImmune（一家美国生物技术公司）。有关Biogen Idec（另一家美国大型生物技术公司）的一场收购战也即将打响。另一家瑞士制药公司Roche（罗氏）对Ventana（一家在亚利桑那州的医学诊断公司）和另一家生产医学设备和非处方药的公司发起了一场敌意收购，Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu（德勤全球）的Terry Hisey先生在一份新的报告里认为这些事情已经超出了传统的限制风险的措施的范围，他认为这预示着一个戏剧性新闻的出现：“集药品、设备和诊断于一体”的制药企业的出现，这可能会导致创新和新的增长机会。如果他的判断是正确的那对急需恢复活力的制药行业确实是个好消息。
我的博客:http://blog.tom.com/jl917921