Hepatitis C Marketing: Applying Primary Care Tactics To Specialty Products

The Food and Drug Administration's back-to-back approvals of Hepatitis C therapies from Merck & Co. Inc. and Vertex Pharmaceuticals Inc. set the stage for a specialty-focused marketing battle the likes of which the biopharma industry hasn't seen in years. For Merck, the launch of Victrelis (boceprevir) is an opportunity to showcase the value of its 2009 acquisition of Schering-Plough Corp., a deal that in recent months has lost luster as late-stage pipeline products have tanked and commercial uptake of medicines like Simponi (golimumab) have stalled. [See Deal] For Vertex, meanwhile, approval of Incivek (telaprevir) marks the biotech's official transition to a commercially focused organization, and catapults the firm into the ranks of the top biotechs, alongside Gilead Sciences Inc., Celgene Corp., and Biogen Idec Corp. ( See "Vertex: Preparing To Go Commercial," IN VIVO , September 2009 Also see "Vertex: Preparing to Go Commercial " - In Vivo, 1 September, 2009..)

That the launches of these two protease inhibitors are critical to how investors judge both companies is obvious. So is...