Comments on: How Do We Preserve Competition and Innovation? http://blog.pharmtech.com/2008/12/08/how-do-we-preserve-competition-and-innovation/ The blog of Pharmaceutical Technology magazine Thu, 09 May 2013 23:30:55 -0400 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: CMC Guy http://blog.pharmtech.com/2008/12/08/how-do-we-preserve-competition-and-innovation/comment-page-1/#comment-11111 CMC Guy Thu, 11 Dec 2008 16:49:02 +0000 http://blog.pharmtech.com/?p=670#comment-11111 You make it sound simple that if remove money from the Marketing pot and put it in to R&D the profits and economics would balance out. Unfortunately it a matter of the prevailing short term requirement to increase shareholder value that gets in the way. Marketing brings in money today while R&D is an expense today so bottom-line effects are opposite directions. R&D is costly high risk long term venture that can be hard to even measure until products reach the market. Marketing can also be costly but returns generally observable quickly. While I can disagree with many Marketing approachs and certain of the excesses I appreciate that it supplies the fuel to keep R&D going (who also can suffer from poor approaches and own excesses). Although Pharma Marketing people now seem to be being hit hard with cut backs too it has always been the case in my observation that when revenue is down R&D gets slowed or eliminated as a quick fix regardless of what that means for future. I am not against generic competition per se, yet one possible solution that would help maintain funding sources for R&D is extending the viable patent life of new drugs to better reflect the long period taken to get from discovery to approval which system now can make the exclusivity period very short (thus prompting aggressive Marketing). You make it sound simple that if remove money from the Marketing pot and put it in to R&D the profits and economics would balance out. Unfortunately it a matter of the prevailing short term requirement to increase shareholder value that gets in the way. Marketing brings in money today while R&D is an expense today so bottom-line effects are opposite directions. R&D is costly high risk long term venture that can be hard to even measure until products reach the market. Marketing can also be costly but returns generally observable quickly. While I can disagree with many Marketing approachs and certain of the excesses I appreciate that it supplies the fuel to keep R&D going (who also can suffer from poor approaches and own excesses). Although Pharma Marketing people now seem to be being hit hard with cut backs too it has always been the case in my observation that when revenue is down R&D gets slowed or eliminated as a quick fix regardless of what that means for future.

I am not against generic competition per se, yet one possible solution that would help maintain funding sources for R&D is extending the viable patent life of new drugs to better reflect the long period taken to get from discovery to approval which system now can make the exclusivity period very short (thus prompting aggressive Marketing).

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