Blockbuster Ecosystems: Sustainable Development?

Blockbusters-despite protests to the contrary-are still vital to the growth of Big Pharma. A therapy area, once established as a blockbuster-fertile franchise, can remain so through the patent expiration of successions of therapy classes, allowing companies that add the right investment to build and sustain new generations of blockbusters. But how to find such areas? High prices and large numbers of available patients can help a therapy area become blockbuster-fertile but are by no means the most important drivers building and sustaining blockbusters. One major prerequisite: big clinical and marketing spending by multiple companies. That means that early investors could end up disproportionately benefiting follow-on competitors.

by Sarah Rickwood and Guy Bate, PhD

Creating a best-selling pharmaceutical has never been easy, but doing so just once or twice used to be able to...

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