Since the ballroom overflowed for the Michael J. Fox
keynote and the overflow room - @ the Westin
Waterfront Hotel - overflowed (meaning I couldn't even
watch it on a tv monitor), I was able to show up
pretty early for Steven Burrill's "State of the
Industry" address (post-lunch) and grab a first row
seat.
I'm going to have to complain about the setup for the
Fox speech. I would estimate that there were at least
1,000 people waiting on line for a half hour who did
not get in. [I had a great Rush Limbaugh joke which I
was going to place here, but it didn't seem
appropriate]
You would think that the staff could've given these
people a heads up earlier, indicating that the room
was at maximum occupancy.
Tomorrow's keynote is being delivered by Queen Noor of
Jordan, but I believe it's closed to the press. As if
that will stop them? My own company recently ran an
event with Alan Greenspan serving as a keynote and the intention was to keep the press out of the room; within an hour, details about Greenspan's speech were emerging from all the wire services (every time the guy speaks, he moves markets).
My point: there is no controlling the press ... unless
the press happens to be me trying to get into a
Michael J. Fox speech.
Speaking of which, I was never able to ask Michael J.
Fox a truly pressing question: why was there never a
"Secret of My Success II: Succeed Harder"? And if time
travel was possible, would he go back and convince his
earlier self to not take the starring role in "Teen
Wolf"?
On to my Burrill notes, which are copious ...
* Midway through the talk, Burrill posted a list of
the top 10 biotechs by market cap and I thought this
would be interesting to share:
1) Genentech
2) Amgen
3) Gilead
4) Celgene
5) Biogen Idec
6) Genzyme
7) Serono
8) Shire
9) Quest Diagnostics
10) MedImmune (being acquired by AstraZeneca for over
$15 billion)
The big upward movement to note here: Gilead and
Celgene. Gilead has had a huge year, mainly driven by
HIV drugs (Atripla, Truvada, and Viread) and sales of
Tamiflu (bird flu), which is partnered w/Roche. Sales
are up for all products except Viread, an older HIV
drug which will likely lose sales to newer Gilead
products.
* Trends cited by Burrill from the past year and many
of these are obvious: Stem cells are a politically hot
issue and the science is delivering, biofuels are
booming, industrial biotech is finally happening, and technology/platform companies rebounded.
* More trends with the theme of transformation: We're
moving from chemistry to biochemistry (note: I've been commuting to the conference from my cousin's place in Worcester ... she's a junior in undergrad, majoring in chemical engineering, with a probable minor in biochemistry -- so there you go, she won't have a hard time finding a job), one size fits all drugs to personalized medicine, from an "aging just happens" philosophy to "aging is optional/controllable" (especially if you're Dick Clark), therapeutics/diagnostics/devices to "theranostics," food for survival to food for health, and treating sickness to preventing sickness.
[Burrill is very big on transformational themes ...
the difference between Burrill and the average transformation-driven speaker is that he knows how to pull it off with significant data behind each transformational pillar]
* Burrill said that "our friends in big pharma are in
trouble" and again talked about the perception gap
with respect to prescription drug costs. Prescription
drugs, as a percentage of total healthcare costs, are
about 10%. But if you ask the public, many believe 60%
of healthcare costs are from drugs. Burrill said there
is a "massive misperception" with respect to the cost
of drugs, and that there has been a "demonization of
pharma." He said pharmaceutical companies may have a
lower reputation than tobacco companies at the moment.
Pharma companies are facing "a world that's thinking
we're selling expensive drugs into the marketplace,"
said Burrill.
* Obvious pressure for pharma that hasn't gone away:
The loss of patent protection for blockbuster drugs
* Burrill said there are troubling signs that
pharmaceutical companies are merely becoming buyers of innovation, rather than sources of it. He said that in Pfizer's reorganization, corporate and business development now report to finance. He interpreted this as "they're going to buy their way into the future," rather than invent/innovate.
* Not only are new product launches declining for
pharma; the new products are also representing a
lesser share of company sales. Big pharma is living
off the sales of older products, he said.
* It's not all good news for biotech companies either.
Burrill alluded to the arrival of biogenerics/biosimilars/follow-on biologics and said, "We'd like to delay the inevitable ... but we will live in a world of [biogenerics]."
===============================================
*** Congressman Waxman recently introduced a bill
which would pave the way for generic companies to
enter the biologics market ... we'll be talking about
this later ***
===============================================
* I found it interesting that Burrill would bring
attention to America's falling reputation in the eyes
of the world. He's clearly much more than a biotech
industry follower; he understands the political
environment and weaves it into each talk, but not in
an over the top way.
As bad as things seem for America, Burrill pointed out
that when it comes to regulatory/research-funding
bodies, we are still the envy of the world. FDA, NIH,
CDC, DoD/DARPA/HSARPA (Homeland Security Advanced
Research Projects Agency), USDA, DOE -- "It's the one
place America still stands above everyone else," said
Burrill.
However, Burrill expressed worry over the current
funding status of NIH and FDA. It was not too long ago
that the NIH budget doubled (during a five year period
from FY 1999 to FY 2003, according to my reading), but
it's now decreasing in absolute dollars, Burrill said.
And FDA funding is "dramatically lagging," he added.
* Burrill also addressed the fact that the US is
losing its competitiveness in science and requires
better financing for education. Where is the next
generation of American scientists? Burrill noted that
the average age of NIH grant recipients is going up
and the average recipient is now over 40.
* Burrill said that we're in an age of cooperation and competition, or "coop-tition" as he put it (ok, that's a little too cute for my taste ... I still like the guy though). He cited the numerous examples of strategic partnering - co-development agreements, co-branding, co-promotion, co-marketing - between companies that at the same time "compete intensely" with one another.
There are a lot of other issues I would like to
address from Burrill's talk, but time is limited -- so
we'll have to wait.
Jeff
Note: When I mentioned the Westin Waterfront Hotel, it
was in homage to the great Tom Friedman, who never
passes up an opportunity to mention a
corporation/product. Of course, if it was Friedman
filing, this entire report would've been about his
visit to the India pavilion. And the fact that India
does indeed have Pizza Huts!
keynote and the overflow room - @ the Westin
Waterfront Hotel - overflowed (meaning I couldn't even
watch it on a tv monitor), I was able to show up
pretty early for Steven Burrill's "State of the
Industry" address (post-lunch) and grab a first row
seat.
I'm going to have to complain about the setup for the
Fox speech. I would estimate that there were at least
1,000 people waiting on line for a half hour who did
not get in. [I had a great Rush Limbaugh joke which I
was going to place here, but it didn't seem
appropriate]
You would think that the staff could've given these
people a heads up earlier, indicating that the room
was at maximum occupancy.
Tomorrow's keynote is being delivered by Queen Noor of
Jordan, but I believe it's closed to the press. As if
that will stop them? My own company recently ran an
event with Alan Greenspan serving as a keynote and the intention was to keep the press out of the room; within an hour, details about Greenspan's speech were emerging from all the wire services (every time the guy speaks, he moves markets).
My point: there is no controlling the press ... unless
the press happens to be me trying to get into a
Michael J. Fox speech.
Speaking of which, I was never able to ask Michael J.
Fox a truly pressing question: why was there never a
"Secret of My Success II: Succeed Harder"? And if time
travel was possible, would he go back and convince his
earlier self to not take the starring role in "Teen
Wolf"?
On to my Burrill notes, which are copious ...
* Midway through the talk, Burrill posted a list of
the top 10 biotechs by market cap and I thought this
would be interesting to share:
1) Genentech
2) Amgen
3) Gilead
4) Celgene
5) Biogen Idec
6) Genzyme
7) Serono
8) Shire
9) Quest Diagnostics
10) MedImmune (being acquired by AstraZeneca for over
$15 billion)
The big upward movement to note here: Gilead and
Celgene. Gilead has had a huge year, mainly driven by
HIV drugs (Atripla, Truvada, and Viread) and sales of
Tamiflu (bird flu), which is partnered w/Roche. Sales
are up for all products except Viread, an older HIV
drug which will likely lose sales to newer Gilead
products.
* Trends cited by Burrill from the past year and many
of these are obvious: Stem cells are a politically hot
issue and the science is delivering, biofuels are
booming, industrial biotech is finally happening, and technology/platform companies rebounded.
* More trends with the theme of transformation: We're
moving from chemistry to biochemistry (note: I've been commuting to the conference from my cousin's place in Worcester ... she's a junior in undergrad, majoring in chemical engineering, with a probable minor in biochemistry -- so there you go, she won't have a hard time finding a job), one size fits all drugs to personalized medicine, from an "aging just happens" philosophy to "aging is optional/controllable" (especially if you're Dick Clark), therapeutics/diagnostics/devices to "theranostics," food for survival to food for health, and treating sickness to preventing sickness.
[Burrill is very big on transformational themes ...
the difference between Burrill and the average transformation-driven speaker is that he knows how to pull it off with significant data behind each transformational pillar]
* Burrill said that "our friends in big pharma are in
trouble" and again talked about the perception gap
with respect to prescription drug costs. Prescription
drugs, as a percentage of total healthcare costs, are
about 10%. But if you ask the public, many believe 60%
of healthcare costs are from drugs. Burrill said there
is a "massive misperception" with respect to the cost
of drugs, and that there has been a "demonization of
pharma." He said pharmaceutical companies may have a
lower reputation than tobacco companies at the moment.
Pharma companies are facing "a world that's thinking
we're selling expensive drugs into the marketplace,"
said Burrill.
* Obvious pressure for pharma that hasn't gone away:
The loss of patent protection for blockbuster drugs
* Burrill said there are troubling signs that
pharmaceutical companies are merely becoming buyers of innovation, rather than sources of it. He said that in Pfizer's reorganization, corporate and business development now report to finance. He interpreted this as "they're going to buy their way into the future," rather than invent/innovate.
* Not only are new product launches declining for
pharma; the new products are also representing a
lesser share of company sales. Big pharma is living
off the sales of older products, he said.
* It's not all good news for biotech companies either.
Burrill alluded to the arrival of biogenerics/biosimilars/follow-on biologics and said, "We'd like to delay the inevitable ... but we will live in a world of [biogenerics]."
===============================================
*** Congressman Waxman recently introduced a bill
which would pave the way for generic companies to
enter the biologics market ... we'll be talking about
this later ***
===============================================
* I found it interesting that Burrill would bring
attention to America's falling reputation in the eyes
of the world. He's clearly much more than a biotech
industry follower; he understands the political
environment and weaves it into each talk, but not in
an over the top way.
As bad as things seem for America, Burrill pointed out
that when it comes to regulatory/research-funding
bodies, we are still the envy of the world. FDA, NIH,
CDC, DoD/DARPA/HSARPA (Homeland Security Advanced
Research Projects Agency), USDA, DOE -- "It's the one
place America still stands above everyone else," said
Burrill.
However, Burrill expressed worry over the current
funding status of NIH and FDA. It was not too long ago
that the NIH budget doubled (during a five year period
from FY 1999 to FY 2003, according to my reading), but
it's now decreasing in absolute dollars, Burrill said.
And FDA funding is "dramatically lagging," he added.
* Burrill also addressed the fact that the US is
losing its competitiveness in science and requires
better financing for education. Where is the next
generation of American scientists? Burrill noted that
the average age of NIH grant recipients is going up
and the average recipient is now over 40.
* Burrill said that we're in an age of cooperation and competition, or "coop-tition" as he put it (ok, that's a little too cute for my taste ... I still like the guy though). He cited the numerous examples of strategic partnering - co-development agreements, co-branding, co-promotion, co-marketing - between companies that at the same time "compete intensely" with one another.
There are a lot of other issues I would like to
address from Burrill's talk, but time is limited -- so
we'll have to wait.
Jeff
Note: When I mentioned the Westin Waterfront Hotel, it
was in homage to the great Tom Friedman, who never
passes up an opportunity to mention a
corporation/product. Of course, if it was Friedman
filing, this entire report would've been about his
visit to the India pavilion. And the fact that India
does indeed have Pizza Huts!
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