Steven Paul, executive vice president of science and technology at Lilly, issued dire warnings in the final keynote speech at the 2006 Drug Discovery Technology conference in Boston.
Current Lilly estimates put the cost of a new medical entity at $1.2 billion. Extrapolating that figure, the cost will reach $2 billion by 2010, Paul warned. “This business model will become fundamentally untenable if we don’t do something about it.”
He goes on!
In the next five years, Paul noted that more than 80 successful drugs will lose patent protection, including Zocor, Ambien, and Lipitor. The effective patent life of blockbuster drugs is approaching 10 years, said Paul, who contrasted that short lifespan with the 50 years of copyright protection enjoyed by Mickey Mouse (pic)!
But wait!
Paul praised the FDA for its Critical Path initiative. “Things have gotten so bad, even the FDA has sympathy for us,” Paul joked.
Poor, poor, Big Pharma.
Please excuse Insider if he doesn't reach for a hankie just yet...... he's just finished reading this excellent commentary by Prof Henry Mintzberg.
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