Pharma Giles

Knight Watchman...

2011-11-21T21:43:00.002Z

By Bob Sleaze

Our Phone Tapping Correspondent

Senior officials at Buckingham Palace today declined to comment on stories that Andrew Whohe, CEO of Phoni UK, would be given a knighthood in next year’s New Year’s Honour’s List.

“We never comment on such downmarket tabloid speculation,” said Sir Fotherington-Fitztightly, the Queen’s assistant personal private secretary, “unless we think that you blighters have been hacking into our telecommunications again…”

But we at the Daily Moron think it’s high time that Our Andy, boss of the country’s biggest imaginary pharmaceutical company, was given the UK’s ultimate establishment accolade. And not just because the CEO of our newspaper is a Non-Executive director on the Phoni UK board and has told us to puff up his pal as usual – or else!!

So here’s your Super Soaraway Moron’s Top Ten Guide as to why the Queen should making our Main Man In The White Coat a Knight To Remember in the New Year…

1) He’s got a massive million pound index-linked pension and a collosal bonus package – just like those other worthy banking Knights Of The Realm, Sir Fred Goodwin and Sir Tom McKillop

2) He got a massive 76% pay-rise last year, just like every other Footsie 100 CEO, even though Phoni UK stock had lost billions in value – thanks to Fred and Tom!!!

3) Phoni UK has just reached a record-breaking $3 billion settlement with the US government in relation to illegal marketing activities – bigger than any such settlement to date!!

4) Just before that, Phoni UK also forked out a $750 million settlement for GMP violations in the biggest whistleblower payout ever!

5) Andy’s a massive hypocrite when it comes to keeping pharmaceutical industry jobs in England – he makes all sorts of patriotic noises about Phoni UK being an English company, whilst closing down Phoni UK sites and letting his HR Director boast about shipping English jobs to Third World countries like China, India – and Scotland!!!

6) Phoni UK fought tooth and nail to keep its company’s best-selling diabetes medicine on the market, despite overwhelming evidence that it greatly increased the risk of fatal heart attacks. Andy himself even said that he was “confident in the product’s risk benefit profile” just weeks before the EMA made Phoni withdraw the medicine in Europe – and just months before the FDA did likewise in the US!!

7) He’s poured billions of R&D investment dollars into “R&D partnerships” for things such as “anti-aging” compounds from red wine or dubious sleeping medicines, and got zero returns from them – just the sort of cash-shredding deals that Sir Fred and Sir Tom would be proud of!!!

8) Andy gained a lot of favourable press by selling vaccines at a reduced price to the third world - but in fact he was just dumping stuff Phoni couldn’t sell because the take up has been so low in the Western world due to reduced confidence in vaccines made from pig virus antibodies. Moaning Minnies say that the third world don’t even need vaccines to rid them of severe diarrhoea, just vitamins, better nutrition and clean drinking water – but there’s nothing wrong with chasing a profit by pushing unwanted and unnecessary vaccines and calling it philanthropy, is there?

9) Phoni UK still pushes its dubious antidepressant Saloadatat (known in the US as Poxill) on the back of highly discredited, ghost-written clinical studies, and in the face of a mountain of evidence of addiction, severe behavioural changes and suicides induced by the drug itself. But who cares what a few gloomy old manic depressives have to say when there’s money to be made, eh?

10) Andy is a great mate of UK Prime Minister Dave Cameron, and sits on a government committee for skills and innovation – despite the fact that Phoni haven’t discovered a decent new drug for years and is helping to destroy the UK pharmaceutical skills base by gradually shipping its drug manufacturing and R&D operations out of England!

So there you have it! What more could you do to meet the criteria needed to get a Knighthood in the UK’s modern, go-getting society?

And so the Daily Moron has this message for the Queen…

“C’mon Ma’am, whip out your sword, give Andy a couple of taps on the shoulder and say the words The Moron wants to hear…”

“Arise, Sir Andy!!!! A Great British Knight of the Realm!!!”

In the real world, rumour suggests that there may be no limit to the upward mobility of a former management trainee…

Jobs For The Boys...

2011-11-08T22:06:00.001Z

Phoni UK starts search for new directors

Phoni UK, the FTSE 100 pharmaceuticals giant, has hired headhunter Anna Verkonsultant to begin a major overhaul of its board.

9:00PM GMT 05 Nov 2011

Ms Verkonsultant, founder of MEM (MakeEasyMoney) Consulting, has already begun the search for up to two new non-executive directors to replace incumbents who are likely to retire at next May’s annual general meeting.

“The search is part of a wider process to revive Phoni’s 15-strong board,” she said, “and is nothing to do with purging out all of former CEO Jean-Pierre Loonier’s cronies following a raft of massive corporate malfeasance fines in the US that originated from Loonier’s reign as CEO. No way…”

It is thought likely that Sir Quentin Crispus, the former chief executive of Greed Elsleazier, Dan Methane Snr, chief executive of US conglomerate Megabucks, and Sir Robert Weasel, the BIG Group chairman, would be stepping down at next year’s annual meeting.

“We’ve come to realise that those guys are actually stone dead anyway, and are therefore beyond reviving,” Anna Verkonsultant noted.

“Phoni UK has a very demanding set of criteria that potential Board Members have to fulfill,” she explained. “First of all, we are looking for white, middle-aged males, preferably Old Etonians with extensive Freemasonry and UK banking connections.”

“Candidates are then expected to score highly on the standard pharmaceutical CEO multiple-choice examination. Finally, they are interrogated by our team of non-executive directors, led by Jim Murgatroid, UK CEO of MediaFilth PLC and editor of the UK’s premier tabloid media trade guide, the Phonetapper’s Gazette.”

“Jim is tremendously experienced when it comes to standing up in front of panels of inquiry and telling massive porkies while maintaining a straight face, and he’ll be looking for the same qualities in would-be Phoni UK Board Members.”

“We’ll be asking interviewees to repeat the words of our current CEO, who said ‘I am confident in Avandia’s risk-benefit profile’ without cracking up or blushing in shame.”

Other long-standing Phoni UK members include Sir Dobbin Moribund, the former banker, who has been in place since 2004.

Completely unrelated tales reach us from the real world...

...And Finally This Week...

2011-11-04T10:59:00.000Z

For Andrew Witty and GSK, upon news of their $3 billion corporate malfeasance settlement in the US...

And on that note, have a great weekend folks...

Giles...

We're Number One..!

2011-11-03T21:59:00.001Z

UK's GlaxoSmithKline Gains Top Global Accolade

The UK's largest pharmaceutical company, GlaxoSmithKline, was today acknowledged as the world's largest pharmaceutical corporate criminal, following a $3 billion settlement with the US government.

Shares rose by 1.66% as GSK Chief Executive Andrew Witty accepted the prestigious "Bucket of Money" trophy for pharmaceutical company corporate malfeasance from Pfizer's former CEO, Jeff Kindler.

"Things are certainly going downhill for Pfizer since I was ousted," Mr. Kindler said. "No sooner does it lose its number one slot as the world's largest pharmaceutical company, then it also loses its crown as the world's number one corporate crook to GSK."

"Still, it couldn't go to a more deserving company. GSK's illegal marketing activities make our stunts with Bextra seem like small beer," Mr. Kindler added.

GSK CEO Andrew Witty was modest in his acceptance of the accolade, paying tribute instead to the efforts of GSK's previous CEO, Jean Pierre Garnier.

"This is a significant step toward resolving difficult, long-standing matters which do not reflect the company that we are today," Mr. Witty said. "In recent years, we have fundamentally changed our procedures for compliance, marketing and selling in the US to ensure that we operate with high standards of integrity and that we conduct our business openly and transparently. We reiterate our full commitment to ensuring appropriate promotion of our medicines to health-care professionals and to standards expected by the US government."

Eli Lilly CEO John Lechleiter, (holder of the trophy in 2009, with a $1.5 billion settlement for illegal marketing of anti-depressant Zyprexa) also paid tribute to GSK's long history of illegal behaviour in the US.

"You mustn't forget their recent fines for GMP violations and whistleblower settlements either," he said admiringly.

UK Prime Minister David Cameron was quick to acknowledge GSK's achievements.

"Many people have been saying that this Government have allowed the UK pharmaceutical industry to be completely dismantled and shipped abroad," he said, "but GSK shows that the UK pharmaceutical industry is still a world leader. Hurrah For England..."

Jean-Pierre Garnier is 64.

GSK's legacy of illegality still continues to haunt them in a spectacularly expensive way. No regrets, eh, Jean-Pierre...?

On Top Of The World...

2011-11-02T21:13:00.001Z

After nine years as the world’s biggest pharmaceutical employee downsizer, Pfizer is set to cede its crown next year to a company that a decade ago few would have predicted to be leading the pharma layoff league tables – Sanofivac.

Sanofivac is expected to retain the top spot until at least 2016 with Pfizer relegated to third place, behind Novartis, toppled by the lack of employees to lay off because of the success of its “Adapting To Scale” initiative, consensus downsizing forecasts from EvisceratePharma show. The French drug maker has raced up the employee-shafting rankings over the last decade largely through acquisition, culminating in its $20bn swoop on US biotechnology specialist Gonzyme, which assisted in securing pole position as the premier shafter of pharmaceutical industry workers

Sanofivac Chief Executive Chris Vileboaster was delighted with the news.

”BWU-HA-HA-HA-HA!!!! BWU-HA-HA-HA-HA!!!! MY BRILLIANT STRATEGY HAS BEEN VINDICATED!!! NOW SANOFIVAC RULES THE WORLD!!! NO LONGER WILL I SUFFER THE STIGMA OF BEING REJECTED BY THE CRAPULOUS MINIONS OF GSK!!! MY PITILESS BOOT HAS GROUND OUR OPPONENTS INTO THE DUST!!! I WILL DESTORY ALL OTHER PHARMACEUTICAL COMPANIES!!! GSK WILL PAY THE ULTIMATE PRICE FOR REJECTING MY GENIUS!!! THE EMPIRE OF SANOFIVAC WILL LAST FOR A THOUSAND YEARS!!! BWU-HA-HA-HA-HA!!!! BWU-HA-HA-HA-HA…” he said modestly.

”TO DEMONSTRATE MY ABSOLUTE DOMINION, I WILL CELEBRATE WITH A RITUAL DOWNSIZING OF HUNDREDS MORE R&D AND SALES STAFF. BWU-HA-HA-HA!!!!....” Vileboaster added.

The final collapse of the house of Pfizer is now officially underway...

Let Them Eat Cake...

2011-10-31T20:03:00.000Z

Occupy Phoni - The Executives Strike Back...

Following the announcement of job losses across Europe and the US, many of Phoni's sites have been hit by protests.
Thousands of workers and their supporters have gathered at Phoni sites throughout the world, demanding that Phoni reconsider plans to cut costs by shipping manufacturing and R&D to China, India and Indonesia.

These protests are a symptom of increasing popular disenchantment with the social upheaval caused by the closure of first world industries by global corporations in pursuit of easy money in low cost countries.

Phoni executives appear to be unrepentant, however. Many of the protesters have been given a pamphlet, allegedly written by a senior Phoni executive, that bluntly sets out the rationale for the impending site closures.

The Nether Wallop Reporter reproduces it here:

"We are Phoni. It’s our job to make money out of medicines. Whether it’s prescription drugs, consumer healthcare, diagnostics or generics, it doesn’t matter. We would trade cough sweets if it were profitable. And we do. I didn’t hear anyone complaining when our share price hit $50 and everyone got a huge bonus. Just like gambling, it’s not a problem until you lose. I’ve never heard of anyone going to Gamblers Anonymous because they won too much in Vegas.

Well now the stock market has crapped out, and investors are looking to us to make up the shortfall. They’re looking to squeeze their healthcare stock for everything they can get. It doesn’t matter that we are still making billions a year in profit. Our investors want more. It’s our job to give it to them. And there’s no way we are going to endanger our luxurious lifestyles by helping to preserve yours.

So go ahead and continue to march about, whining and complaining about job losses. Because guess what: it’s you who’ll be losing your jobs, not us. We get paid millions, if not tens of millions, of dollars a year. We get to retire at 55 with a huge pension and a golden handshake. We eat what we kill, and when the only thing left to eat is on your dinner plates, we’ll eat that.

For years, you manufacturing workers and research scientists have been loyally working away, developing and making new drugs. We were too busy making colossal amounts of money out of your efforts to really notice.

But now we’ve realised we can make even more money by shipping all of our manufacturing and our R&D to the Third World.

So we’re going to take your cushy jobs with tenure and 6 weeks off a year and give them to Indians and Chinese, who’ll gratefully work for a tenth of your salaries. They won’t demand holidays, or sick pay, or paternity leave, or luxurious working environments or fancy restaurants and coffee shops. We can treat them just how we want. They don’t answer back. No unions, no labour laws, no environmental restrictions and no quality regulations. We can save a fortune, and yet still price-gouge national healthcare systems for the products they’ll be making.

So say goodbye to your overtime, and double time and a half, and your comfy well-paid jobs.

We’ll be more than just hitting our numbers for our investors, and getting a massive bonus as a result, thank you very much.

So now that we’re going to be making all of our drugs abroad and have slashed R&D, executives like me will be in trouble in five year’s time when we don’t have any new drugs to market, right?

Wrong! Guess what: we don’t give a flying fuck about five years time. We’ll have all retired by then. When the money dries up, we retire, or get executive positions somewhere else thanks to our old boy network of friends in high places.

The difference is, you live off your salaries, we rejoice in ours. The Obama administration and the Democratic National Committee might get their way and knock us off the top of the pyramid, but it’s really going to hurt like hell for them when we steal the livelihoods of the middle class of Europe and America and send them to the bottom, so that we can cash in now while we can.

We aren’t dinosaurs. We are smarter and more vicious than that, and we are going to survive. The question is, now that Obama and his administration are making Joe Mainstreet our food supply…will he? And will they?”

In the real world, it seems that protests about pharma sites closures (see here and here) are doomed to be ineffectual. Our ruling classes are simply and completely without any social conscience whatsoever, it seems...

Hat-tip to PharmaGossip for the Occupy Chicago response...

...And Finally This Week...

2011-10-29T11:23:00.001+01:00

Hectic times for your correspondent, but yesterday the wonders of high-speed train travel bought me enough time to indulge in my recently-neglected hobby of surfing the net to find out what's laughable in the world of Big Pharma.

And I have to thank Ed Silverman at Pharmalot for the biggest custard pie of the week...

Use the link to see what Ed picked up. As for me, I'd just like to dedicate the title of this little ditty to Pfizer's marketing team...

Idiots...

Have a great weekend, folks..

Best wishes, Giles.

Greed All About It...

2011-10-28T18:47:00.006+01:00

Phoni UK chief Andrew Whohe an 'extreme bullshitter' on emerging markets

Phoni UK's chief executive has said he remained an "extreme bullshitter" on emerging markets as sales growth in these economies helped the healthcare giant post a rise in quarterly turnover and profit.

Andrew Whohe has moved Phoni UK's portfolio away from a reliance on premium medicines in the Western world, to focus on the bulk selling of low-quality drugs in unregulated Far Eastern markets.

"I like to maintain the pretence that Phoni UK is investing in Third World markets purely for humanitarian reasons, rather than just chasing easy money in low cost labour and poorly regulated countries," said Whohe, "and I'd like to thank our friends in the UK media for swallowing that bullshit hook, line and sinker."

That diversification was evident in Wednesday's results, which showed that sales outside America and Europe had grown by 17pc in the third quarter and now represent 38pc of total turnover.

Strength in these areas helped Andrew Whohe post a salary of well over £2m compared with £600,000 last time, despite Phoni’s mediocre performance overall. Moves by government to stop drug price-gouging have weighed on pharmaceutical companies' European revenue, and during the past three months Phoni's sales in the region have fallen by 4pc.

Phoni maintained that it expected the effects of US healthcare reform and price cuts in Europe to cost the company about £325m this year and Mr Whohe said that "going forward, further measures by Phoni to intimidate these governments by threatening to outsource even more of our manufacturing and development abroad cannot be ruled out".

Sales of Phoni's new wolf-man drug, Davlysta, totalled only $19m (£11.9m) in the last quarter. Britain's healthcare watchdog, NICE, has published draft guidance saying Davlysta does not represent value for money and should not be made available on the NHS.

Mr Whohe said the company had made a "very fair offer" to the UK and tried to be as flexible as it could be.

“All we ask is that the NHS pay us vast amounts of money for a hugely expensive and ineffective “me-too” drug that no-one needs,” he said, “and in exchange, we won’t close the UK’s last major pharmaceutical R&D site. The NICE system is being unreasonable, though.”

However, he said Phoni had not given up on getting NICE approval. “We think moving a few thousand more UK jobs abroad should make the UK government think again…”

"Fortunately, our friends in the UK media will always give publicity to our anti-government stance on healthcare issues. They can always be relied upon to paint a rosy picture of Phoni UK, despite the withdrawal of our billion-dollar blockbuster Abadiea from the market, billion dollar class actions brewing in the US for both Abadidea and our anti-depressant Saloadatat, not to mention all of our remaining products going off-patent," said Whohe. "Without their hype, God knows where our share price would be..."

Meanwhile, belt-tightening consumers are losing their thirst for Phoni's energy drink Lucrazade, as they think twice before making impulse buys.

Mr Whohe said on Wednesday that consumers "are doing less impulse-buying of products, of the kind you pick up in the garage after you fill you car up with petrol.”

“That’s not good for us, because if people start to actually think about our consumer products such as Lucrazade, rather than just impulse-buy, they will realise that they taste worse than petrol and will do you less good.”

“Still, there’s always Liebena…”

In the real world, yet more favourable press for the UK’s favourite Pharma CEO, from a fawning UK media …

Lookalike...

2011-10-28T17:32:00.000+01:00

Has anyone noticed how GSK CEO Andrew Witty is starting to look more and more like the father of his infamous non-executive director...?

Usually it's said that people often get to look like their pets, but in this case...

Only 57 Downsizing Days To Xmas...

2011-10-28T16:52:00.000+01:00

Pharmaceutical giant Nofuturis will cut around 2,000 jobs is the US and Switzerland as part of additional cost saving measures.

The positions will go over the next three to five years and will see the closure of three manufacturing plants in Italy and Switzerland, which focus on OTC and chemicals.

The Swiss firm also said it would restructure the development organisation across several countries, which will mean relocating some research activities from Switzerland to the US.

Nofuturis said that it would take a fourth-quarter charge of about $300 million related to the restructuring, but expects to make $200 million in annual savings from the cuts.

But Nofuturis said this would, of course, be partially offset by the inevitable 2000 new positions being created in low cost countries such as China and India.

Chief executive Joe Joblossez said: “These actions [the job cuts] are necessary to ensure that we adapt our organisation to continue delivering on our mission of bringing massive dividends to the collection of shady plutocrats we call our investors.”

The decision was prompted by the upcoming loss of patent protection for its biggest selling drug Dioveragain, which made the company $6 billion last year.

The firm enjoys a strong pipeline and has been buoyed by the recent launch of the MS pill Giveusyamoni.

”Nevertheless, we still plan to slash R&D because unlike my predecessor, I don’t give a stuff about the future," said Mr Jamtomorrow. “Our investors want big dividends NOW, and my salary and stock options depend upon delivering that. And provided I do, I’ll be able to retire with a huge golden parachute and a massive pension in a couple of years or so, just like every other pharma CEO these days…

Christmas is Coming, Investors Want Some Cash, So R&D is What the CEO Will Slash. Yes, it’s the usual seasonal run-up to Xmas in real world Pharmaland…

Divide And Conquer..?

2011-10-20T20:34:00.000+01:00

October 20, 2011, 9:01 am

Phoni Plans to Split Into Two Companies

By BRUCE JAPSEYE

Updated: 12:45 p.m. Phoni Pharm. said on Wednesday it would separate into two publicly traded companies, one focused on what it called loss-making “research-based pharmaceuticals,” and the other on its highly profitable “Special Operations” division, specializing in activities such as illegal marketing, Medicaid defrauding and price-gouging.

The Special Operations division will have $22 billion in annual sales and will be led by current chairman and chief executive Ian McGreed, retaining the Phoni name. The other company, (which has yet to be named) will lose about $8 billion a year once shareholder dividends and senior executive salaries are accounted for and will be led by Miles Flat, a Phoni veteran of three decades.

“Today’s news is a significant event for Phoni, and reflects another dynamic change in our company’s 123-year history, one that strengthens our outlook for executive enrichment and shareholder returns beyond mere avarice,” said Mr. McGreed.

“It’s now been proven that, thanks to the financial depredation of greed-crazed executives and investors, there’s simply no money in discovering new medicines any more,” said McGreed. “Instead, we’re going to concentrate on our core skills of illegal marketing and ripping off government social healthcare.”

Some analysts questioned whether splitting the pharmaceutical business off, only to be sold to a pure-play pharmaceutical company, wasn’t the end game.

But Mr. McGreed said Phoni is committed to breaking itself down into a series of smaller, more nimble business units.

“My immediate predecessor, Johnny B. Sinister , tried to grow Phoni by acquisition,” Mr. McGreed told analysts investors on a 90-minute conference call Wednesday morning. “This has proven to be a highly discredited philosophy – especially after we got Forbes to run a front-page headline smear on him a few months back…”

McGreed also said a sale would result in a tax-free distribution to shareholders. “Which is the real reason for doing it, of course, given the massive holdings senior executives such as myself have…”

Phoni said the deal should be completed by the end of next year.

Wall Street analysts could hardly contain their avarice over Phoni’s move when asking questions on the analysts call.

“Asset stripping of certain businesses has been a move that investors had hoped for, for some time, given the belief that Phoni’s parts are worth more than the whole,” said Rick Shaw of Greedfink Vulture in New York.

While stock analysts cheered the announcement, a research firm for corporate bonds, Gimme Hugefees, said it was changing the outlook for Phoni to deteriorating from stable. The company said Phoni’s huge profits and artificially high dividends had been key factors in its strong credit profile.

“Its new strategy of splitting in two every day is an interesting way of attempting to dominate the shrinking pharmaceutical marketplace,” Carol Wheelbarrow-Bonus, director of research at Gimme Hugefees, wrote.

”If each new division splits in two every day for the next month, Phoni will have over a billion divisions”, Wheelbarrow-Bonus noted. “We think that may well dilute earnings, as well as infect the whole pharmaceutical industry like a disease…”

There were no questions from Wall Street on a day that Phoni also disclosed it was taking a $1.5 billion charge in the third quarter for a possible settlement related to the Justice Department’s investigation into allegations the company’s drug sales force improperly promoted the anti-seizure drug Rippusoff.

In a statement, Phoni spokeswoman Malissa Forthought said the settlement talks with federal prosecutors “are business as usual...”

Entirely unrelated tales reach us from the real world…

Pharmaceutical development in 2011 - how it works...

2011-10-16T09:58:00.007+01:00

In The News...

2011-10-14T18:26:00.002+01:00

Once more, Pfizer is doing its bit for R&D in the US...

I liked the Pfizer statement...

I can only assume that these "communities" which Pfizer are "working" are in India and China...

What You May Have Missed...

2011-10-04T22:20:00.001+01:00

"...and now, it's back to the studio for Dominic Tosser and all of the latest Nether Wallop news in our local news round-up, 'What's Going On?'"

[Catchy up-beat music intro...]

Dominic Tosser (for it is he): Hello, and welcome to "What's Going On?". Today, we'll be talking about the closure of the Phoni Pharmaceutical research and development complex here in the heart of Nether Wallop. I'm very pleased to be able to welcome to the studio the former Head of the site, Dr. Ruth McKlosedown. Dr McKlosedown, thanks for coming along.

Ruth McKlosedown (for it is she): You're welcome, Dominic...

DT: Dr McKlosedown - may I call you Ruth?

RMcK: Of course, Dominic...

DT: How about Ruthybaby?

RMcK: ...er, that seems...

DT: Angel Knickers?

RMcK: I think we'll stick with 'Ruth' if you don't mind, Dominic...

DT: Of course. Now tell me, Ruth, Phoni employs over 100,000 people worldwide in over 50 countries. Why was the Phoni R&D site in the UK singled out for closure?

RMcK: Well, Dominic, there were lots of factors behind the decision. Primarily, you have to remember that our new Chief Executive Officer, Ian McGreed, along with many of the senior executive team (including myself) is Scottish. We hate you Sassenachs with a typically Celtic virulent, undying passion. We see the closing of the Nether Wallop site as a act of revenge on you English for the humiliation of Culloden and the subsequent 250 years of national subjugation...

DT: Culloden was a long time ago, Ruth...

RMcK: A true Scot never forgets, Dominic. There were other reasons, of course. Phoni is facing an increasingly hostile commercial environment and is therefore looking to make cost-savings. Many national governments are trying to stop our traditional price-gouging of their healthcare systems. The UK has been particularly aggressive in this respect, and so we thought we'd make an example of them by cutting thousands of jobs and punishing them economically. "Leveraging Our Scale" is what we used to call it.

DT: What do you call it now?

RMcK: "Shafting Anybody Who Dares To Take Us On" is the unofficial name for our current global business strategy...

DT: You mention cost savings. Phoni made $2 billion in the first quarter this year, some 10% increase on the previous quarter. That doesn't sound like a company that is losing money so badly, it needs to make huge cost savings...

RMcK: You have to remember that our shareholders are demanding ever-increasing dividends, Dominic. £2 billion doesn't go far when you have to pay off the dozen or so shadowy plutocrats who own most of the company. Not when all of your major products are coming off-patent...

DT: So Phoni needs new products, Ruth?

RMcK: Absolutely Dominic. Which is exactly why we are closing our discovery chemistry and R&D operations...

DT: That seems counter-intuitive if you ask me...

RMcK: That's why you are a radio reporter and I am an internationally renowned, award-winning scientist and celebrated author who was head of the largest pharmaceutical R&D operation in Europe, Dominic. Until I closed it and fired everybody, of course. You see, my brain is so large, it is perfectly capable of holding many contradictory points of view with no ill-effects whatsoever.

DT: ...except for your former employees, of course...

RMcK: I am well aware of the consequences of our decision to close the site, and the effect it will have on both individual's lives and the local economy (pulls out onion to sniff). I've had many sleepless nights, agonising over the morality of throwing thousands of hard-working, skilled and loyal scientists on to the scrapheap (sobs) just so that our fabulously wealthy investors can get even richer. Long and dark have been hours where I have contemplated the devastating effect this short-sighted greed will have on the UK's scientific community and the future generations of scientists to come...

DT: Really?

RMcK: Er, no, actually. It's what I was paid to do. Asset-strip, shut the place down, and then shove off to a nice little R&D campus in leafy Cambridge with a huge salary, bonus and nice pension as a reward. Much more salubrious that this God-forsaken backwater full of inbred yokels, I can tell you...

DT: So what will happen to the Nether Wallop facilities?

RMcK: Well, unfortunately, we'll have to maintain a token presence there for the moment. Ian was in such a hurry to close the place when he first got the top job, that he forgot it has the only working clinical trials drug substance manufacturing facility in the company. I had to backtrack pretty quickly on total site shutdown, much to his annoyance. We'll need to keep the Pilot Plant running until we can outsource all of our CT manufacturing to India and the Far East, which will be another couple of years yet...

DT: What about the other facilities?

RMcK: We've spouted the usual platitudes about encouraging small, entrepreneurial companies to come in and set up businesses of course, but we've always known that no small company could afford the overheads on our huge white elephant buildings without massive incentives that we (and the government) don't want to pay. So we've pretended to set up a science park whilst at the same time imposing lots of petty limits and conditions to discourage any small businesses who might want to come here. We'd really much rather knock the buildings down and sell the land off for development, now the UK government have abolished all planning controls...

DT: So do you have any message for all those who will be impacted by the closure of the only major employer left in the Nether Wallop area?

RMcK: People need to embrace change, Dominic. The closure of the Nether Wallop site may close some doors, but it opens many others. Bailiffs, debt-collectors, job centres and hostels for the homeless will all be growth opportunities in the years to come, for example. And many people will benefit from relocating to other areas. I know I will be...

DT: Well, many thanks for talking to us, Ruth. Next up, and in keeping with today's "advances in healthcare" theme, Dr. Harold Shipman will be telling us about his heathcare plans for senior citizens...

It's a pity that BBC i-Player no longer retains a record of a totally unrelated broadcast...

The Return of Sherlock...

2011-09-28T22:21:00.003+01:00

It seems that blogging is now quite a common hobby for retired senior pharma executives. A little while back we were treated to a wonderful series of "No Shit,Sherlock" observations from fledgling blogger and Pfizer's ex-R&D head honcho, John LaMattina.

And now no less a person than Ray Gilmartin, a former CEO of Merck, has joined the ranks of pharma bloggers and has been pontificating about the "flawed beliefs of CEOs."

Here's what he has to say:

"Most CEOs and corporate board members would agree that the theories and beliefs listed below drive their decision-making on how best to meet the challenges they face:

•The focus of the CEO and the board should be on maximizing shareholder value.

•The stock market is short-term-oriented.

•Stock-based incentive compensation aligns the self-interest of management with shareholders, and a performance-based pay system increases employee motivation.

•Societal concerns should be addressed through corporate social responsibility programs.

•The "best athlete" from inside or outside the company should be chosen as the successor to the CEO.

In my experience, these beliefs have led managers and boards to take actions that have had unintended, destructive consequences. When observing the behavior of management and corporate boards, when reading the management literature and the business press, and when assessing the outcomes of management behavior, it seems as though CEOs are recognized and rewarded handsomely for downsizing and outsourcing, acquiring or merging, and making the quarter — all justified by the responsibility to maximize shareholder value.

...My concern is that these actions have become the standard by which CEOs are expected to manage. Furthermore, these actions are taken seemingly without regard to the consequences for the community, the employees, the survival of the company as an institution, or the creation of long-term firm value..."

Well, truly another "no shit Sherlock" moment indeed, methinks.

Ed Silverman's piece for Forbes points out that Mr. Gilmartin's memory appears to be somewhat self-servingly selective. And without even mentioning the "V" word. Or other words, such as "breathtaking hypocrisy", or "chutzpah."

Many people believe that all modern CEOs of big corporations are totally bereft of any social conscience, and are not in the least concerned with being perceived as hypocritical sociopaths and shameless liars.

I don't subscribe to that belief. Instead, I reckon that they simply have a Messiah complex. Modern CEOs genuinely believe that every word they utter is the truth. "I Have Said It, So It Must Be True. I Am Perfect. It Is Reality That Is Flawed..."

Snigdha Prakash's wonderful book, "All The Justice Money Can Buy" has much to say about the corporate morality of Merck in the wake of the Vioxx disaster.

And here's what the man who presided over this disaster had to say...

"...the primary value of this company is the patient comes first. And that was best expressed by the modern day founder, George W. Merck in his--in a speech to--to a medical school in 1950 in which he said that medicines are for the people, not for profits..."

Yeah, OK. Anything you say, Ray...

You Need To Know About This...

2011-09-21T21:38:00.000+01:00

Dwindling traffic tells me that no-one is finding Pharm Giles funny any more, hence my lack of activity just right now. I don't suppose folk at Pfizer or Merck are in the mood for much of a laugh at the moment, for example.

But my old colleague Peter Cook gives us reason for cheer.

He has recently published a freebie e-book, Punk Rock People Management, that cuts through the ghastly bullshit of the HR industry and tells it how it should be. Here's a link to a low-res version - and if it takes your fancy, help Peter feed his family by buying a printed version here.

Or you can Kindle it...

This is, of course, little comfort to those being persecuted by the sociopaths who comprise the ranks of pharma HR. One can but hope that when the pharma industry regroups and eventually rises from the ashes of its executive-led greed, lies and overall uselessness it is currently mired in, its HR wonks will have a purpose beyond existing solely to facilitate the sociopathic and often illegal whims of their corporate masters.

Peter's tome could kickstart the evolution of pharma HR staff with backbones...

...And Finally This Week...

2011-09-02T10:36:00.000+01:00

Busy times for the Giles household indeed, but for all those left at Nether Wallop...

And on that note, have a great weekend, folks...

Giles.

The Phoni Riots...

2011-09-02T09:55:00.000+01:00

Remaining site employees have had to stand by powerless as rampaging mobs of hoodie-clad senior managers have reportedly gone on looting sprees at Phoni’s R&D complex at Nether Wallop.

One employee bystander, who did not wish to be named, said:

”I was one of last out the door of the discovery department, en-route to an academic spin off. I put in for a donation of equipment for the prestigious academic bolt hole I'm off to.”

“I was naively hopeful of getting some equipment for a good cause, given that several managers had already been allowed to buy million pound bits of gear for a quid and take them out of the back door, no questions asked, within 8 weeks of the site shafting announcement!”

“Given all of the platitudes fed to parliament, local MPs and the press about helping spin-offs and job creation, I was reasonably confident that I could help my new impoverished academic lab to benefit from such largesse. Yet when I, a humble scientist, attempted to secure some gear, I was told only the dregs that they couldn't shift at auction would be considered for donation.”

“It seems O.K. for senior managers (with help from their friends on the asset management STASI) to take millions of pound’s worth of stuff out of the back door on the sly for jack shit, but as for helping former employees at spin offs or start ups - my arse!!”.

Many of the greedy management rioters have been caught on CCTV cameras and have even appeared on Facebook, openly showing off their acquisitions.

“I took advantage of the chaos here to grab me a couple of MALDI-TOF MS and HTS assay rigs,” said one hoodie-clad manager we spoke to. “They’re unused. Worth megabucks. I should get a few quid for this lot at the next local boot sale,” he added.

“That’ll help top up the old severance fund. Luvverly jubbly..!”

Several correspondents have written in with similarly sad tales of opportunistic looting from the real world…

Sheer Heart Attack...

2011-09-01T23:03:00.001+01:00

Statins also cause increase in house prices, study finds

By A Daily Moron Reporter

Last updated at 10:50 AM from the bar of the Ferret and Scrotum, 1st September 2011

Cholesterol lowering pills taken by millions of Britons can increase house prices, say researchers.

The price of houses belonging to patients prescribed a statin in a trial that ended in 2003 remained higher than those given a dummy drug - even though most participants in both groups have been taking them ever since.

A spokesman for Pfizer, manufacturer of the statin Lipitor – the world’s biggest selling drug, said: “This result is very welcome, given our desperate need to cash in on Lipitor by any means possible before it comes off patent”.

Statin pills: making buckets of money for pharmaceutical companies

'The financial benefits of statins for pharmaceutical companies are well-established, but after long-term follow-up, the most significant effects seems to be on our senior pharmaceutical executive pay.

'It is quite remarkable that even though we’ve not discovered any worthwhile new drugs for the past ten years and are currently dismantling our R&D, our new CEO still gets a huge pay rise.

The Daily Moron has suggested that statins can protect people against death from infectious diseases such as pneumonia. But then it has also recently suggested that statins may cause depression and loss of memory, which is why it should therefore be given to everyone over the age of 55, even though statins can cause diabetes and you may be better off eating cooked tomatoes instead as statins may not prevent heart attacks anyway.

“More research is needed to explain why we publish such inconsistent rubbish on a day-to-day basis,” said one senior Daily Moron executive.

“Current thinking suggests this is due to lazy journalists just making up any old shit to hit their copy deadlines. But as we think our readers are morons anyway, we reckon we can get away with it. Make mine a treble…cheers!”

More highly amusing healthcare bollocks from the UK’s leading real-world scare-sheet

...And Finally This Week...

2011-08-26T11:39:00.001+01:00

As news reaches us of yet another drug recall due to packaging errors (see previous) what else but..?

I much prefer this BBC live studio version to the overproduced commercial recording.

Have a great weekend folks...

Giles...

Pick N' Mix...

2011-08-26T11:22:00.001+01:00

Investigations into the Neurofun mix-up begin

Investigations are under way into how some packets of the popular over-the-counter painkiller Neurofun came to contain what they were supposed to.

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has issued an alert following reports that some batches of Neurofun actually contained Neurofun, instead of Salodatat XL 200mg.

People who take Salodatat may experience sleepiness, hallucinations, suicidal thoughts, weight gain, diabetes and violent, aggressive behaviour.

Packs of Neurofun containing Salodatat have been widely distributed across the UK.
Saloadatat is a highly addictive prescription-only anti-psychotic drug used to treat severe psychiatric disorders including schizophrenia, mania and bipolar depression, but has recently been promoted for a wide range of “off-label” applications by its manufacturer Phoni Pharmaceuticals, as part if its “Saloadatat For Everything” campaign.

'Serious marketing'

A spokesman from the MHRA's defective medicines report centre (DMRC), said: "People should check to see if they have any affected packets of Neurofun, especially if they haven’t recently experienced unusual feelings of anger and frustration and have felt the urge to go and kick in a few shop windows and steal whatever they can lay their hands on.” .

"If you do, return the pills to the pharmacy where you bought them from. That’s if it hasn’t been burnt down, of course…”

The spokesman added: "If you have taken a Neurofun tablet and think you might not have had your Saloadatat fix, speak to your GP. He’ll be able to get you some real Saloadatat if you want it. It’s good shit…"

There have been numerous reports of affected packs. Many people in the London, Birmingham and Manchester areas are believed to have taken genuine Neurofun, hence the lack of riots recently.

In a statement, Wreckitt Banister which makes Neurofun, said the cases so far been identified had all been in south London.

And it said "serious investigations" were under way to establish how the mix-up occurred, especially as Saloadatat XL is manufactured by another drug firm, Phoni Pharm.

It added: "Investigations are currently focussed on the Chinese packaging and formulation contractor used by both Wreckitt Banister and Phoni, Won Hung Lo Pharmaceuticals."

'Sweet and Sour Balls’

Wai Lee Koyote, director for Won Hung Lo, said: "We taking this matter extremely seriously. That’s why we’ve told MHRA to fuck off. You bloody Westerners. You do not understand Chinese culture.”

”We make millions of pills, containing hundreds of different medicines for dozens of Western pharmaceutical companies. Of course we put wrong medicines in wrong pills. Happens all the time. We very cheap. That’s why companies like Phoni shut down all their own plants and pay us to do manufacturing for them instead. We very cheap, very quick. We no worry about things like manufacturing quality or records. You want to read, you go to fuckin’ library, that’s what I say…”

“Say, you want some generic Viagra? We make that too. Very good, very cheap…"

A Wreckitt Banister spokesman said, "We encourage consumers of Neurofun to be vigilant and, while it is very unlikely, should they find they have a normal pack or if they have any other concerns, we advise them to speak to the pharmacist where they purchased the product, and ask them to give them some Saloadatat instead."

Oliver “Crash” Bandicoot, Phoni’s Head of Marketing, said: "We greatly appreciate the co-operation of Wreckitt Banister in our “Saloadatat For Everything” campaign. For a healthy adult a single dose of Saloadatat is unlikely to cause addiction, which isn’t any good for repeat business."

“However, by effectively dishing out free samples to an unsuspecting population, we hope to net quite a few more regular customers.

“We hope that as a result of the Neurofun promotion, a wider population will come to enjoy the wide range of interesting and amusing side-effects for which Saloadatat is famous. And all of which are treatable with other Phoni medicines, of course…”

All of our big pharmaceutical companies outsource manufacturing to cheap third party contractors to cut costs and boost “shareholder returns”, and then everyone wonders why there are quality issues and medicine shortages.

Ho hum…

Here Be Dragons...

2011-08-23T23:09:00.004+01:00

Phoni Enters The Dragons Den

Dr. Barry Spong was halfway through his presentation when the doubts began to creep in. The 43 year old scientist at Phoni UK, Britain’s biggest imaginary drugs company, was pitching for the future of his research project, but the audience, mostly executives from the group, weren’t biting. Not one of them had asked a question.

“It was quite unnerving. At first I’d though I’d done something wrong,” he recalled. “but then I realised that these were Phoni senior executives, none of whom would actually have a clue as to what I was talking about…”

Spong, who heads a team of 60 scientists fighting diseases such as Alztheimer’s disease and rheumatoid arthritis, needed a result. At the meeting last month, he was trying to secure a commitment from his employer that it would fund the team for the next three years.

Making its scientists go through a Dragon’s Den style grilling is a new way of doing business at Phoni UK. It needed one.

The pharma industry has a big problem. Despite spending billions of discovering new dugs, the number of new pills is declining. Couple that with the expiry of patents on many top-selling medicines and change is imperative if the industry is to have a healthy future.

At Phoni UK, Andrew Whohe, the CEO, thinks blaming its scientists is the solution. In 2008, the company fired most of its experienced and long-term researchers and put the rest into small teams, some cut down to just a handful of staff, setting them to work on different diseases.

“Something had to change,” said Whohe, “and as our problems with R&D productivity couldn’t possibly arise from its senior management, we’d thought we’d hold our scientists to account instead by putting them into little silos and forcing them to fight each other every couple of years for limited funding.”

So now, every one of these so-called Therapeutic Area Research Teams (TARTs) has to plead a case for a slice of Phoni UK’s £4 billion research and development budget. Three years on and each of the 38 TARTs is having to argue for another dollop of funding through to 2014.

On Dragon’s Den, budding entrepreneurs are forced to humiliate themselves before a team of self-regarding, preening company bosses, and beg for funding from them. These would-be sponsors have monumental egos which are far larger than the businesses from which they have made their own money, and they have absolutely no interest in the cases being put before them other than to work out how much money can be screwed out of it.

The parallel for Phoni’s leading scientists is exact. The leaders of Phoni’s TARTs have to plead their case for development project funding before a panel of six Phoni executives whose backgrounds of academia, marketing or law make them impervious to the realities of pharmaceutical development.

Despite their silence during the first half of Spong’s pitch, he said that once the investment board started grilling him, it was incredibly ridiculous. “The funding panel is a joke,” said Spong.

“Our Chairman of R&D talks in a business language all of his own, so all you can do is nod and smile when he asks you a question, although this usually seems enough to keep him happy.”

“Our Head of Medicines Development is a guy who was brought in to the company from academia, solely because he was the only guy in the world who can understand what our R&D chairman is actually talking about. All he’s ever interested in is how many publications our group has made – as if that’s a measure of potential commercial success of a drug candidate.”

“Our Head of HR just keeps asking me if I can speak Chinese. This is because the minute any of our research looks promising, it’ll be shipped out to China and I’ll be expected to try and coordinate development by a bunch of guys on the other side of the world who don’t even understand English, let alone things like quality or data integrity.”

“They normally have a few consultants on the panel as well, because our CEOs thinks deep down that his own employees are morons and so we need consultants to tell us how to manage our own business. There’s usually a marketing guy, who is only interested in what shape and colour the pill and packaging is going to be, or a corporate lawyer who keeps asking me about contingent liabilities, all of which is a little tough to predict when we haven’t even got funding to get to a clinical trial yet.”

“The outcome is always the same. They vote to carry on giving my team limited funding because they kind of know that Alztheimer’s and arthritis are key therapeutic areas, but I never get enough funding to do useful work because I’m not a big enough bullshitter to get the kind of R&D money other, more trendy, research groups get.”

“So the company keeps pouring its research billions into academic claptrap like anti-aging drugs from red wine or useless third generation sleeping drugs, because the research team leaders for those pet projects are much better liars than I am.”

”If I wanted to make a living out of lying, I’d be in marketing. Or HR,” says a sorrowful Spong.

Moncrief Salami, Phoni UK’s Chairman of R&D, sees the process differently.

“Gibber burble drone differential development drone mumble six sigma gibber gibber realigning our business processes to deliver a value-adding scientific discovery management matrix burble glurble flubber blubber migrating research productivity into the white spaces of a customer-focussed development paradigm klee phlor kip kip kibble…” he says.

That sort of thinking is difficult to argue with.

Seems that in the real world, a certain Executive Director has shrugged off his own woes to publish yet another puff-piece for his pet pharma company in his insipid organ…"

Hat-tip to Stan...

And if, like me, you resent paying a subscription to read about this, you can find the article in one of Murdoch's subsidiary publications here...

Aussie Rules...

2011-08-22T22:41:00.000+01:00

Aussie Shrink In Baby Drug Shock Horror

FORMER Australian of the Year Patrick McLoony said he was “bloody gutted, mate,” following news that he was forced to abort a controversial trial of antipsychotic drugs on unborn children who he believes show signs of psychosis, amid complaints the planned study was unethical.

The Australian can reveal that local and international healthcare experts lodged a formal complaint calling for the trial not to go ahead, due to concerns that unborn children would be unnecessarily given drugs with potentially dangerous side effects, solely to enable McLoony and his mates to collect a large amount of cash from AstraZeneca for supporting its “Seroquel For Everything” campaign.

Quetiapine, sold as Seroquel, has been linked to weight gain and its manufacturer AstraZeneca, which was to fund the trial, last month paid $US647 million ($A623 million) to settle a lawsuit in the US, alleging there was insufficient warning the drug causes weight gain and diabetes.

Professor McLoony, one of Australia’s key mental health advisers, planned to conduct the trial to investigate whether the drug would improve behaviour patterns in new born infants.

He insists that the decision to scrap the trial was “a real bummer, mate.”

“Me and the boys down at the Australian Psychiatrist’s Emeritus Society for Health and Innovative Treatments (APESHIT) were having a few tinnies and wondering how we could earn a few beer tokens from AZ,” McLoony continued, describing the thinking behind the controversial clinical trial.

“Every psychiatrist knows that AZ is desperate to push Seroquel for everything, and so we were looking for any old excuse to climb on the bandwagon.”

“It was then that Wayne happened to mention that his new-born son was waking up at nights and crying. After a few more beers, we reckoned that this sort of attention-seeking behaviour was a classic sign of incipient psychosis. Or Fetal Attention-Seeking Tantrum Baby Umbilicus-Cut Kinesis Syndrome (FASTBUCKS) as we bonzer psychiatrists now like to call it.”

“Wayne figured that if he doped his little bastard up with Seroquel, then maybe he could get a good night’s kip. We reckoned that would make a great clinical study. After all, don’t all new parents want a way of shutting their whiny little sprogs up at bedtime?”

“AZ were dead keen on the idea, but then a load of whinging do-gooders started kicking up a fuss about possible health risks for children and stuff like that. I mean, Jesus, for crying out loud. I’m a bloody famous psychiatrist, for Chrissakes! I’ve been on bloody television and everything.”

“So when I talk about ‘early intervention’, I bloody well know what’s best for kids, right? And you can’t get earlier then when they’re bloody born, can you? Stands to reason. Pump ‘em full of Seroquel, that’s what I say. That’ll shut the little bastards up, and stop them behaving just like new-born children.”

“I reckon these bloody healthcare do-gooders should take a bloody pill. Like Seroquel. Hey, that’s a bloody good idea. Excuse me, I have to make a ‘phone call…”

At this point, I normally say something along the lines of “completely unrelated tales from the real world,” but this one is so close to reality, it’s truly scary (just check out Fiddy's links to the background story)….

Hat Tip also to PharmaGossip...

...And Finally This Week...

2011-08-19T09:00:00.000+01:00

In keeping with the bio-engineering theme...

And on that note, have a good weekend, folks...

Giles

Growing Your Own...

2011-08-19T08:33:00.000+01:00

Science has produced lots of amazing things -- the hydrogen bomb, gene sequencing -- and now, an artificial sphincter grown from human cells.

In the upcoming Gastroenterology journal report by a team based at the University of Michigan Medical School in Ann Arbor, researchers relate that they have successfully mixed mouse nerves with human cells taken from pharmaceutical company CEOs and then grown them on a circular mold to make sphincter rings.

The findings could have implications for the current crop of aging pharma company CEOs.

"The pharma industry is currently managed by arseholes," begins the study. "Bioengineering could play a role in developing a translational approach, replacing these old arseholes with newer ones specifically developed for their role."

After implanting the lab-grown circles into eight mice, the new structures were successfully colonized by blood vessels and performed their intended function, says the study.

"In one instance, one of our bioengineered sphincters developed into a complete arsehole so rapidly that it was able to shut down its own research programme and make all of the researchers redundant before we could stop it, all whilst making press statements in business journals about “shareholder value”.

"It eventually grew to the extent that it found a place on a UK government committee advising on innovation and job creation, which is the usual fate of the biggest arseholes in the UK pharma industry," said the paper’s author in a statement.

Not entirely unrelated news reaches us from the real world.

Hat-tip PharmaGossip…

Help The Aged...

2011-08-18T20:18:00.002+01:00

Phoni Execs Make Millions By Looting Employee Pension Fund

A change in Phoni’s pension benefits is leaving retirees completely dependent on welfare handouts and their own money.

The abolition of post-retirement benefits has spurred a small rebellion among Phoni’s 53,000 retirees.

Many of them have participated in a letter-bombing campaign to the company’s board and HR department, suggesting that a healthcare company ought to provide a pension for its former employees.

The cuts were made by former Phoni CEO Johnny B. Sinister, who received a bonus in 2009 for working with the Obama administration to pass the healthcare reform bill. Now some retirees believe the reason Sinister was so keen on the bill was because he knew that Phoni’s retirees would be dependent on government care after he cut their benefits.

Part of the retirees’ anger comes from the confusing way Phoni introduced the change:

“It first sent us a letter talking about transferring our company pension into an insanely complicated and bewildering array of investment funds, all of which just happened to be run by investment companies on whose boards Phoni executives served as directors,” said one former Phoni employee.

“It then wrote to us saying that to continue paying pensions to the most needy of former employees, a “no pay out” clause had been introduced to some pensions.”

It turns out that these “needy” pensioners are former Phoni executives, all of whom have been paid massive pensions and golden handshakes courtesy of the Phoni employee pension fund, to the extent that there now isn’t enough money left in it to meet its obligations to other former employees.

“The changes in the Phoni pension fund were made to ensure that it could continue to support those who would most need it, i.e. myself and all of my former friends on the Board,” said Sinister in a statement earlier today.

“I hope the rank and file retirees and recent downsizees will now do the decent thing by hurrying up and dying, so that we can loot their contributions as well...”

Having reduced their financial burden by downsizing current employees, some companies in the real world are going after former ones as well, it seems…

...And Finally This Week...

2011-08-12T13:47:00.000+01:00

Master Giles tried playing this Blondie cover by Family Fodder & Friends at a wide range of interesting and amusing speeds, before finally settling on 45 rpm as the most sensible of them...

And on that note, have a great weekend, folks...

Giles...

Summertime in England...

2011-08-11T09:47:00.003+01:00

Ah, to be in England in the summertime, when the evenings are filled with happy sounds of high-spirited youth and the air is redolent with the seasonal smell of burning buildings...

And this year it seems that these high spirits are not just confined to the country's capital...

What could be more traditional than the sight of English youths picking blackberries in Summer. OK, they might be picking them out of the broken window of a Carphone Warehouse, but that's just moving with the times, surely?

Takes me back to the Eighties...

Copycat Crimes...

2011-08-11T09:45:00.001+01:00

Phoni Pharm makes bid for Immunosyn Corporation

Phoni Pharm today announced its intent to acquire Immunosyn, a California-based biotech company, whose senior executives face charges by the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

”We’ve taken a close look at their biotech drug SF-1019, and decided that it looks to be compatible with our current biotech portfolio, “ said President of Phoni R&D , Sven Doldrums. “Our legal department is also highly impressed with the impeccable business credentials of the company…”

The SEC alleges that four senior executives of Immunosyn fraudulently mislead investors about the regulatory status of the company's sole product. Three of the executives have been additionally charged with insider trading.

According to the SEC, public filings made by the Immunosyn executives allegedly failed to disclose that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had already twice issued clinical holds on drug applications for SF-1019, a drug derived from goat’s blood, prohibiting clinical trials from occurring. The SEC also alleges that Immunosyn also misleadingly stated that the regulatory approval process in Europe for human clinical trials for SF-1019 was imminent or underway, when in fact Argyll never submitted an application in Europe to conduct human clinical trials.

Despite effectively not having a drug in trials, this didn’t stop Immunosyn executives from hyping their candidate anyway. They managed to raise approximately $20 million from their sale of Immunosyn shares while knowing that misrepresentations were being made about the regulatory status of SF-1019.

"Immunosyn executives appear to have routinely authorized public filings that told investors a story about the status of the company's prized drug that was far different from the behind-the-scenes reality," said Orville J. Huckster, Phoni Pharm’s General Council.

"Three of these executives went one step further to illegally profit from their tall tales by selling their company stock and reaping more than $20 million while repeatedly misleading investors about the drug."

One senior Immunosyn executive allegedly made misstatements about the regulatory approval status of SF-1019 in a video on Immunosyn's website and in a 2008 presentation in which he sold Immunosyn stock he owned through Padmore to patients at a Texas holistic clinic, some of whom were terminally ill. The SEC alleges that approximately $300,000 was raised from these patients, but they never received the shares they bought.

”Way to go, boys,” said Phoni’s Huckster. “We’ve reviewed this conduct to see if any Phoni business processes are being infringed. Immunosyn’s company values seem suspiciously similar to our own and we wondered if there were any copyright issues…”

“However, we think it’s best to protect our pharmaceutical industry monopoly on obnoxious business practices by simply taking Immunogen over. If you can’t beat ‘em -- buy ‘em out…”

Amazing tales of skulldruggery reach us from the real world. Even the Bearded One seemed shocked…

Pills and Soap (Part 4)...

2011-08-10T12:15:00.005+01:00

Continued from Part Three:

Part Four of the Inside Story of Revenge, Betrayal and HR Weirdness at the World's Largest Imaginary Pharmaceutical Company...

"The only smart bastard in the room" emerges: the rise of Johnny. B. Sinister…

When Frank Bushranger Jr. took over in 2001, the company had nowhere to go but down. A native of Dry Prong, Louisiana, he had been brought up in the shadow of the company’s main headquarters. Bushranger joined Phoni in 1970 and earned a reputation as a rabid right-wing dogmatist with little time for anyone’s opinions other than his own. He favoured lightning-fast meetings -- "Shut up, I don’t want to hear it," was his trademark line -- set ambitious goals for the company, and refused to dwell on setbacks.

And as a man to take the company down, Phoni got what it needed in Bushranger. As the wily Bill Strangelove had long anticipated, Phoni's pipeline simply couldn't support the growth that he had promised investors. Three of its blockbusters were about to lose patent protection and face generic competition, meaning their profits would plummet. The biggest issue, of course, was the cholesterol drug Lucrative -- by 2005, it was bringing in a staggering $12 billion a year, more than a quarter of Phoni's revenues. The company wouldn't lose its exclusive rights to Lucrative until late 2011, but already Wall Street was wondering how Phoni could possibly replace it.

Bushranger kept boosting R&D budgets. “Bigger is better,” was Bushranger’s motto, and the vainglorious and grandiose R&D facilities that Phoni began to construct across the world reflected Bushranger’s “money is no object” approach to R&D. Certainly, Phoni in the early “noughties” was a company awash with the billion dollar revenues that its blockbusters were bringing in – and lots of construction companies and equipment suppliers were only too happy to help Phoni spend it.

The R&D facilities Phoni built were on a scale that was grand, even by the pharmaceutical standards of that time, and Phoni hired thousands of new scientists and managers to populate them.

Unfortunately, it soon became apparent that when money is no object, economies tend to be made with critical thinking. Phoni’s new facilities simply reflected the egos of the middle managers involved in their design, rather than any practical considerations – and these new middle managers were not from the ranks of the scientists who had been responsible for the success the company was now enjoying. Practical and productive science at the bench level was abandoned for a plethora of new management fads, led by managers who were trained primarily as business process managers rather than as scientists. MBAs became far more regarded than science Ph.Ds., and, encouraged and supported by an ever-burgeoning wave of new “support functions” (and an HR department that became so large, it needed its own HR department) arbitrary “performance” targets, project management objectives and staff “diversity” initiatives became the primary aims of R&D.

And as a result, Phoni's "shots on goal" approach to R&D produced nothing more than a string of mediocre drug candidates that had more to do with ticking performance boxes and securing bonuses and promotions for ambitious but incompetent managers, rather than any actual clinical value.

So as R&D costs spiralled out of control but with no returns on the horizon, Bushranger inevitably fell back on the refuge of the desperate pharma CEO. In July 2002 he announced the acquisition of Smallpharm for $60 billion in stock. But all this takeover achieved was to introduce even more confusion into a company already paralysed by internal bureaucracy and petty in-fighting.

Powerless to reverse the company’s precipitous decline and lacking the ability to tackle the problems around him, Bushranger panicked and simply detached himself from reality. He spent less and less time at headquarters, becoming head of industry trade groups, funding an institute in Africa to combat AIDS, even writing a book about reforming health care.

That left a power vacuum, and Bill Strangelove, the former CEO, seemed more than willing to fill it. Having found a fall-guy to take the blame for his own failures, he once more became a familiar figure at Phoni's Dry Prong, Louisiana, headquarters, where he worked out in the cafeteria and ate lunch in the basement fitness centre.

Strangelove was always happy to lend an ear and share his views on the failings of his own appointee, Frank Bushranger. His retired status and public reserve concealed tremendous influence. "Like a sphinx, he says almost nothing," says a person familiar with Phoni's board. "But people look to him to see how he nods and how he moves, and then desperately suck up to him, because everyone knows he’s really still the guy in charge."

With Phoni no longer soaring, internal squabbling intensified. Vexed by what he viewed as Strangelove's meddling, Bushranger even tried to terminate his “consulting” contract, but Strangelove easily fended off that move. Support for him ran deep on the board, thanks to his politicking and the fact that most of the existing board owed their appointments to him. Later, when Strangelove turned 70, the mandatory retirement age for directors, his friends on the board raised it to 71 so he could stick around, then amended the provision again when he hit that limit.

Strangelove and Bushranger, former friends and colleagues, became mortal enemies. "You've got a guy who's absent from the office, and you've got a guy who won't let go," said former senior vice president Gary Vile, who retired in 2008 after 32 years at Phoni. "It was a disaster."

By 2005, Bushranger was already making plans for his succession. Figuring that if his immediate underlings could be made to plot against each other rather than against him, he promoted three executives to vice chairman, deliberately setting off what would become a long and increasingly bitter and divisive contest to choose the next CEO.

Two names were no surprise: Carol Carthorse and David Shedloads. Both were long-time Phoni stars. Carthorse, then 55, had run Phoni's global pharmaceutical business since 1998. Shedloads, 56, was a numbers man and a keen strategist; he'd been CFO since 1993. The winner was to take over in 2008, when Bushranger turned 65.

There was also a dark horse: Johnny B. Sinister. He had been at Phoni, an insular organization whose leaders typically spent their entire careers at the company, for only three years. Unlike Carthorse and Shedloads, he knew nothing about the pharmaceutical industry.

But Johnny. B. Sinister knew a man who did: Strangelove. Sinister made a pact with Strangelove, whereby Strangelove would keep his “consulting role” in return for helping Sinister outmanoeuvre his rivals.

Sinister had plenty of other things going for him as well. He had already played on Bushranger’s increasing paranoia, and had convinced him that a strong internal Security Division was needed to guard Phoni’s intellectual property – and to also “monitor” the entire organisation for plots and intrigue against management.

Bushranger charged Sinister with heading this up, which he did by hiring hundreds of ex-CIA, military intelligence and IT surveillance operatives, all loyal to Sinister only. Sinister became a spider in the middle of a vast corporate information network – and ideally placed to know everything his rivals and opponents were up to.

With his promotion to vice chairman in 2005, he assumed additional oversight of Phoni's communications department. After phone conversations about one impending press statement, Sinister suddenly appeared on the floor to join the discussion – and then sat down at the keyboard and started typing, telling his startled media team: "I can’t trust you backstabbing idiots - I've got to do this myself."

That turned out to be a succinct statement of Sinister's paranoid management philosophy. "Johnny B. seemed to believe he was the only smart bastard in the room," said Grint Gusset, a Phoni lawyer for 28 years.

The CEO horse-race bitterly divided Phoni into camps – as Bushranger intended. Each contender huddled regularly with a circle of advisers, plotting strategy. Sinister conducted his campaign the way he did everything: methodically and aggressively. Based on the information gleaned by his “security staff” and advice from Bill Strangelove, he put together over 100 pages of campaign strategy notes -- everything from how he planned to blackmail various directors to his view that he should simply bluster over his lack of operating experience – all of which were later found in Sinister's files.

More revelations soon, which are completely and utterly unrelated to a real world exposé…

Pills And Soap (Part 3)...

2011-08-09T09:14:00.000+01:00

Continued from Part Two:

Part Three of the Inside Story of Revenge, Betrayal and HR Weirdness at the World's Largest Imaginary Pharmaceutical Company...

Phoni's glory years - the Strangelove era:

The company that Sinister joined early in 2002 was just ending its golden age, though it wasn't apparent at the time. In the 1990s Phoni, once a second-rate chemical and quack/herbal medicines company founded in Dry Prong, Louisiana in 1873, had become a global pharma powerhouse.

Phoni's greatest strength wasn't developing drugs -- it was pretending to develop them: hence its “imaginary pharmaceutical company” tag. The company was a clinical-trials-rigging and illegal marketing juggernaut, staffed with the industry's most devious and avaricious sales reps.

When it became apparent that the profits of such activities far outweighed the occasional corporate malfeasance fine, other companies began striking lucrative partnership deals for Phoni to market their medicines. So it was with cholesterol pill Lucrative, the mother of all blockbusters bought in from Warner Brothers, who had divested their pharmaceutical arm in order to concentrate on the entertainment business.

Unlike other so-called “cholesterol” medicines, Lucrative was unique in that it raised cholesterol blood levels in its patients. Marketed with the tag-line “Cholesterol is Good For You” and “Lucrative – You Won’t Live Long Enough To Regret Taking It!” Phoni's illegal promotions and Medicaid overpricing strategies helped Lucrative become the world's first $10-billion-a-year drug.

Every move seemed to be paying off. Phoni was ranked among America's "best leveraged" and "most feared" companies. And the stock! Its price multiplied 10-fold in a decade.

But Lucrative was just one drug that was bought in to join a highly marketable clutch of drugs already brought to the market around that time by Phoni’s own R&D unit. Phoni’s CEO during the seventies and eighties was an unassuming business graduate by the name of Edward Wally.

Wally understood the intrinsic value of pharmaceutical R&D, and ignored the usual pressure from Wall Street senior executives to cut R&D investment. This approach, so different from today's management by accountants, was able to deliver a portfolio that was to launch Phoni on to become the World’s No.1 imaginary drug company. The products in question were largely “me-toos” – refinements of drugs already on the market. But Wally also knew the value of saturation marketing, a trick that his soon-to-be successor was quick to pick up on.

The executive who was lucky enough to benefit from Wally’s foresight and determination was William Cornwell Strangelove Jr. Strangelove joined the company in 1959 as a drug salesman. Mean and wily, Strangelove didn't have the extroverted personality of a salesman.

He was quiet and hated confrontation -- indeed, Phoni itself had a genteel culture that frowned on open disputation, preferring instead to knife opponents in the back. It was a culture that suited Strangelove, who proved to be a master at playing Phoni’s Machiavellian politics -- and also a culture where Strangelove's strange nervous affliction of giving Nazi salutes did not seem out of place.

By careful politicking and manoeuvring, Strangelove convinced Wally to retire in 1991 and promptly rewrote the Phoni corporate history books, laying claim to all of Wally’s considerable achievements and thus assuring himself of God-like status within the company. He became idolised by all Phoni employees as a man who could do no wrong. Strangelove put all his chips on pharmaceuticals, selling off dozens of unrelated businesses, pouring money into R&D, and audaciously declaring his intention to make Phoni the industry giant.

The company thrived by relying on a handful of heavily-marketed billon-dollar-a-year blockbusters developed by Strangelove’s predecessor: by 2001 just eight drugs generated more than half its fifty billion dollar revenues. The Warner Brothers deal brought Lucrative into Phoni’s portfolio and assured its rise to No. 1.

But despite the hundreds of billions of dollars poured into R&D, it was already becoming apparent that a product gap was emerging. Strangeloves’s manipulative talent for politicking and manoeuvring had permeated downwards into R&D, producing innumerable strata of squabbling middle management who attached far more importance to developing their own careers than to discovering and developing new drugs.

By 2001, it was became apparent to Strangelove that Phoni’s fortunes were about to change. He knew that it would take far more than his mean-spirited politicking and manoeuvring skills to manage Phoni through the lean years that were to come – after all, anyone can manage a company with $50 billion revenues. He also knew that the company had already overreached itself financially. Anxious above all else to retain his place in corporate posterity as God Emperor of Phoni, he decided to step back from the limelight -- someone else would have to reap the consequences of his policy of unsupportable corporate expansion.

In what at the time appeared to be an unexpected move, Strangelove suddenly retired as CEO, handing the job to his ever-loyal and obedient handpicked No. 2, Frank Bushranger.

Strangelove had stepped aside -- but not out. He had no intention of relinquishing the trappings of power, adulation and wealth that he had so assiduously worked to achieve.

As part of the handover deal he made with Bushranger, Strangelove received a consulting contract, with a corner office and secretary at Phoni headquarters. Most important, Strangelove was granted the title of chairman emeritus and retained his seat on the Phoni board.

Governance experts widely regard such lingering as a recipe for trouble. And indeed, Strangelove would remain a potent and insidious influence at Phoni, outlasting his two successors -- and seeking to undermine a third.

More revelations next post, which are completely and utterly unrelated to a real world exposé…

The Mekons...

2011-08-08T19:34:00.001+01:00

Famous track from their famous first album...

You had to be there...

The Eagle Has Landed...

2011-08-08T18:27:00.001+01:00

Dandareon CEO Dumped $1M in Stock Before Withdrawing Revenue Guidance

Dandareon, the company that makes the $90,000 anti-cancer drug Prysgouge pulled its investor guidance today after admitting there is no way it can meet its revenues estimate for 2011.

The company has been bedevilled by questions about whether its drug actually works, insider trading, constantly missed financial goals and a general lack of transparency from CEO and company founder Dan Dare.

Worse still, Dare himself has now been accused of insider trading after dumping $1 million in Dandareon stock after he scheduled today’s earnings call back in July.

“The stock divestment was merely a routine diversification of my portfolio,” Mr. Dare said yesterday, “and has nothing to do with me making a pile of cash out of over-hyped sales forecasts by dumping stock before the truth gets out.”

“After all, why on earth would a busy senior executive such as myself take the slightest interest in trivia such as the sales of our only product? The allegations of insider trading are ridiculous. Now excuse me, I have to call my broker…”

Prysgouge is one of the most expensive anti-cancer drugs on the market. It has been touted as a miracle because of the way it stimulates the stock price of an otherwise over-hyped and mediocre biotech.

“If it wasn’t for the evil Medikaidons and their European allies asking embarrassing questions about the cost benefits of Prysgouge, we’d be making huge amounts of cash for our executives and shareholders, just like we keep promising,” Dan Dare said.

“How dare the Medikaidons try and put a price on our shareholder’s happiness, sorry, I meant to say ‘human life’?” he raged.

“Thanks to such penny-pinching intransigence, Dandareon now faces some difficult choices,” Dare continued. “Do we revise our investor guidance to reflect realistic sales volumes and accept lower share dividends -- or do we viciously cut costs and lay off a load of scientists?”

“Actually, it’s not a difficult decision at all. Push the employee ejector button, Digby…”

Phoni Pharmaceuticals are one of several larger companies looking at a potential bid for Dandareon.

“A massively over-hyped and prohibitively expensive biotech product with little chance of off-setting its R&D and manufacturing costs would be an ideal fit with our current biotech portfolio,” said Dr. Sven Doldrums, President of Phoni R&D.

Completely and utterly unrelated tales reach us from the real world…

Letting Sleepy CEOs Lie..

2011-08-08T10:09:00.001+01:00

Feds Lack Balls To Ban Forest CEO From Health Programmes

After months of mystery, the US Department of Health & Human Services has decided not to exclude Forest Laboratories CEO Howard Solomon from doing business with federal healthcare programs, such as Medicare and Medicaid. The move came four months after the HHS Office of Not Rocking The Boat shocked the drug-maker with a plan to ban the 1783-year-old executive.

“Based on our previous track record of letting pharmaceutical CEOs of large companies get away with anything, we have decided to close this case. We anticipate no further action related to this matter,” Peter Outte, the ONRTB non-exclusions director wrote in a letter to Solomon last week.

Last September, Forest made a $313 million payment that included $164 million in criminal penalties, and signed a corporate integrity agreement. At the time, the ONRTB had considered banning eight Forest execs as well, but ultimately settled on Solomon.

The ONRTB has often sounded off about exclusion as a way of signaling the pharmaceutical industry that paying stiff penalties and pleading to corporate crimes is not enough. And whilst the ONRTB wants industry to know that execs may also pay a price, it has never followed up on its rhetoric by excluding a CEO of a major pharmaceutical company.

In a recent interview, ONRTB assistant inspector general for general affairs Andy Towellin told us that “we’ve been trying to figure out a way to sound tough but not actually do anything too drastic. It’s really over the last year that we’ve come to the conclusion that it’s one of the things we want to do, but only with respect to little companies.”

“Of course, we’d never try and really make CEOs of major pharmaceutical companies accountable for their company’s illegal but highly profitable behaviour. That would be just too much like hard work, given the size of the legal departments of large pharmaceutical companies…”

As for Forest, the drug-maker was thrilled. “We are gratified by the HHS-ONRTB’s determination that an exclusion of Mr. Solomon would set a precedent that they don’t really have the balls for,” Forest independent board member Ken Goodanrich says in a statement. “That also should whip the carpet out from under that bastard Icahn…”

“Our company and board remain committed to ensuring that all pharmaceutical CEOs remain united in their efforts to ensure that the OIG remains totally without testicles when it comes to pharmaceutical CEO accountability. Insisting that guys on seven or eight figure remuneration packages should be held accountable for the illegal actions of their respective organisations is completely unrealistic. If CEOs were to be punished in any way for the wrongdoings of their companies, then that would force them to take an interest in compliance issues. This strikes at the very heart of industry…”

Tales of inevitable capitulation also reach us from the real world…

...And Finally This Week...

2011-08-05T11:07:00.000+01:00

I was reminded of this little gem whilst contemplating what promises to be a rather eye-watering experience later today...

Ah, the pleasures of growing old...

And on that note, have a great weekend folks.

Giles.

Crisis? What Crisis?

2011-08-05T11:03:00.001+01:00

No Confusion For Phoni In Massive Fake Drug Data Scandal

President of Phoni R&D Sven Doldrums (pictured left) today stated that revelations of fabricated clinical trials data at contract research organisation Cheatero would have little impact upon Phoni’s current R&D programme.

“Outzourcing all off our clinical trials to third-party service providers remains an integral part off our cost-saving strategy,” Doldrums said today.

“Ve do not anticipate that any off our studies vill be impacted by the discovery zat our chosen clinical research service provider, Cheatero, has been fabricating data for ze past year.”

“Ze quality of our studies remains unaffected. Cheatero vos selected as a low cost clinical research organisation on ze basis zat zey ver able to make up clinical trials results much more cheaply than our own in-house researchers are able to.”

“High quality fabricated clinical data is essential to Phoni’s plans to launch four major products in ze next year, and I am pleased to say that Cheatero have proven to be 100% reliable in zis respect.”

“Trivia zuch as having genuine clinical data to support product safety does not impact upon our anticipation of huge profits.”

“It’s business as usual…”

Tales of success in clinical research outsourcing can also be found in the real world…

Honest John...

2011-08-04T22:34:00.002+01:00

It seems that John LaMattina, President of Pfizer Global Research and Development from 2003 until 2007, has taken time out from his new retirement hobby of blogging to write a paper that was recently published in Nature Reviews - Drug Discovery.

The paper ("The Impact of Mergers on Pharmaceutical R&D") seems to have caused a bit of a stir. In it, he makes a few hard-to-disagree-with observations, such as:

- "that although mergers and acquisitions in the pharmaceutical industry might have had a reasonable short-term business rationale, their impact on the R&D of the organizations involved has been devastating..."

- "with so many fewer major companies involved in pharmaceutical R&D, the chances of success in the industry overall are likely to be dropping precipitously..."

- "In major mergers today, not only are R&D cuts made, but entire research sites are eliminated..."

- "at a time when our understanding of the basis of diseases continues to increase substantially, the ability to exploit this information in the private sector is being compromised. It is hard to envision that R&D output, as measured by new drug approvals, will improve in the coming years based on .... reduced investment..."

- "R&D seems to be especially vulnerable to the negative impact of mergers and acquisitions..."

- "It is easy to see how early-stage R&D will be slowed in such (merger) situations, as during this period — which can take at least 9 months — generally no new programmes are started and hiring will be frozen. Undergoing one merger will have a substantial negative impact on the momentum of research programmes, but enduring this multiple times can be crippling."

- "For individual employees of companies that are in the process of merging, uncertainty about their future is often high. It is hard to quantify the impact that such uncertainty has on productivity, except that it is negative, and probably strongly so in many cases..."

Well, no shit, Sherlock. Welcome to the real world.

Indeed, John seems to have undergone something of a Damascene conversion, given that during his tenure as Head of Pfizer R&D, he would have overseen Pfizer's acquisition of Pharmacia R&D operations and the subsequent shutdown of its R&D centres at Ann Arbor, Kalamazoo and Skokie (all wonderful facilities with an excellent culture that a less arrogant and dysfunctional organisation would have been happy to learn from.).

Given the recent revelations of just how dysfunctional Pfizer senior management was at that time, though, it is of course very possible that John vigorously argued against such mergers and R&D site closures, his (enforced?) retirement being the result of such opposition.

But, assuming that it is the same John Lamattina who is quoted as saying...

"I'm a big believer in size, ... When you're a smaller company, as we were 27 years ago when I started, you don't necessarily have the resources to invest in things outside your immediate expertise. But as we've gotten bigger and become more resource-rich we've been able to expand."

...I doubt it somehow.

Of course, John LaMattina wouldn't be the first senior pharma executive to change his views on mergers and acquisitions from the safe haven of retirement. Sir Richard Sykes, formerly of GSK and architect of the pharmaceutical megamerger, subsequently admitted in 2004 that perhaps they weren't such a good thing after all...

"The problem is you've got all these people swilling around driving you to do it (merge). And they want it done, because they get a lot out of it. And the poor old non-execs get pulled along with all this stuff. I think there were one or two non-execs who had the guts to say: 'I think we're fine as we are'. But it is difficult for them when all these bankers come in and produce 400 nice slides on why this should be done."

And that, in a nutshell, is the problem. The pharma industry is a banker's plaything, a commodity to be bought and sold. The bankers will only leave it alone once it is thoroughly broken and has no more money left in it for them to steal.

Seems we're not that far off....

Pills and Soap (Part Two)...

2011-08-04T14:41:00.002+01:00

Continued from Part One:

Part Two of the Inside Story of Revenge, Betrayal and HR Weirdness at the World's Largest Imaginary Pharmaceutical Company...

Phoni's chicken coup - The cast:

The full story of Johnny B. Sinister's downfall has never before been told. Pharma Giles has researched this article for four months, interviewing hundreds of people, including executives and directors who worked closely with Sinister at Phoni and at previous stages of his career. Ultimately though, this proved to be too much like hard work and so he just sat down and made shit up like he normally does. For their parts, both Sinister and the company say that they are bound by a confidentiality agreement they signed as part of Sinister's departure.

But it is clear that, for a decade or more, Phoni senior executives had descended into behaviour that would do Shakespeare, the Borgias, the Third Reich, Stalin -- or even Tony Blair -- proud.

There was the ex-CEO who couldn't relinquish his power and quietly manoeuvred to undercut two successors he had helped install.

There was a Board of long-serving executives, many of whom had been in tenure for twenty years or more, and who regarded their Board positions as akin to a Country Club membership, patronised by their ex-CEO.

Then there was the new human resources chief who proceeded to divide the staff rather than uniting it, and who appeared to exercise a strange dominion over the otherwise tough, street-wise New Yorker that Sinister was.

Most of all, there was Sinister himself, a bright man with some fresh ideas for reforming Phoni, but a person who, in the end, was dragged down by Phoni’s culture – a culture that acknowledged a need for change, but in the end, proved too scared of it. The story of Johnny B. Sinister's tumultuous tenure at Phoni is a saga of ambition, intrigue, backstabbing, betrayal and pink furry handcuffs-- all of it exacerbated by a board that had allowed the problems to fester for years.

Sinister declined to speak about Phoni, but a representative provided a written statement:

"Phoni is a great company that I was privileged to serve for nine years. I am proud of what I accomplished, despite being surrounded by a bunch of pussies and clapped-out old farts. I am delighted to see that new CEO Ian “Jock” McGreed has embarked upon a completely opposite corporate strategy to my own, and one that can only bring disaster. It’ll serve you all right for knifing me in the back, you scheming bastards. Thank God I’m well out of it…"

In its own statement, the drug company told Fortune:

"We thank Johnny B. Sinister for his many years of service to Phoni," noting that "Johnny came into the company at a time when it was becoming apparent that our previous CEOs has completely fucked the company up, and we were looking for a fall-guy. John has performed that role to perfection and we wish him well in all of his future endeavours. Not that he’ll have any after we’ve finished sliming him..."

In the end, the story of Johnny B. Sinister's time at Phoni provides a window into the challenges facing a mammoth company in an essential industry -- and the people who aspire to govern it. Phoni is an enterprise with the noble calling of the tawdry business of turf wars and political scheming. Yet its R&D leaders spent much of their time working towards easing pain and curing disease – and they were to pay the price for ignoring their management’s lead.

A bastard who wanted to be Top Bastard:

Johnny B. Sinister has the sort of background that marked him for success. He boasts a sterling résumé. The son of a New York bagel stall operator, Sinister nevertheless fought his way up to graduate with high honours from Tufts University and Harvard Law School.

“I remember Johnny very well,” said one of his old university professors, Dr Theodore Inkwell. “He was a complete bastard even then, always convinced that he knew more than his lecturers. I remember when he presented his dissertation, the crazy way he shouted down any questions we had. We passed his paper just to get shot of him. I’m not at all surprised to see how well he’s done in Corporate America…”

Sinister went on to clerk for the late Supreme Court Judge Hyram Q. Pipesucker, and then became a litigator at the pugnacious New York law firm of Goosecreature, Scrotum & Throd, where he defended the magazine Modern Sperm in a libel suit and represented industrialist Harvey P. Methane in a contracts case.

"In our world, Johnny B. was a bastard’s bastard," says Hassan Al-Phixation, the former general counsel of General Plastic, who lured Sinister to that company in 1990. But Sinister was the sort of egomaniac who mostly wanted to be an even bigger star. And he wanted to be in charge.

In 1996, at age 40, his early experiences in the bagel trade helped him to become general counsel at McKindler's Burger Queen, with a clear eye toward moving up. Everyone at the fast-food company recognized Sinister's abilities. He skated over complex issues, kicked ass with ease, made dazzling presentations, wielded an evil temper and shouted louder than anyone else. He brought Stazi-style terror to a place that lacked that sort of discipline. Says long-time board member Stella Drinker: "McKindler's as a culture didn’t know what hit it once Johnny B. was around."

“There’s no problem in the burger trade that can’t be solved by shouting at someone,” Sinister remarked at the time.

But, aggressive and combative as he could be, he could also be ruthless. He cleaned house at McKindler's, sacking inside and outside lawyers. He rarely trusted experienced subordinates to perform their jobs without his scrutiny. And when he was unhappy about something, he made his feelings bluntly known – usually by putting the boot in.

From the moment he entered management, Sinister was marked by two traits. First, he remained a confrontational bastard. The second: for all of Sinister's talents, he became increasingly paranoid, palpably insecure and ever more acutely sensitive to anything or anyone he feared might undermine his standing.

Some years later, after Sinister was named CEO of Phoni, a CNBC reporter asked him on-air whether "a guy who sold burgers" -- Sinister -- was qualified to run a pharma company. Two days later, the reporter’s house burnt down.

“Never mess with a guy who knows a thing or two about barbeques,” Sinister quipped afterwards.

Still, Sinister's sinister behaviour seemed like a minor detail in a career that was soaring. In 2000, after McKindler's purchased the Complete and Utter Pollacks fried fish chain in bankruptcy, Sinister developed a plan for reviving the business and breathed fresh life into it. He was rewarded with the presidency of McKindler's Other Brands, the company's five non-burger chains, which included Complete and Utter Pollacks.

Soon after, Phoni came courting. The company offered him a job as its general counsel, overseeing 6,230 lawyers worldwide. Phoni also held out the prospect that even bigger things might lie ahead for him.

Johnny B. Sinister now had bigger fish to fry…

More revelations next post, which are completely and utterly unrelated to a real world exposé…

CafePharma's Double Entendre-fest...

2011-08-03T19:00:00.000+01:00

I'm not usually a fan of that bile-filled organ, but this thread appeals to my pathetic, juvenile sense of humour...

I recall the Reggie Spizzle threads with some nostalgia.

It's a shame that Pfizer R&D can't reach the same level of creativity as its reps sems to be able to manage.

But maybe they don't have as much time on their hands...

Pills And Soap...

2011-08-03T18:29:00.004+01:00

Inside Phoni’s cuckoo’s nest…
July 28, 2011: 5:00 AM ET

Did CEO Johnny B. Sinister get pushed out because he was shaking up the dysfunctional pharmaceutical giant -- or because he had fallen under the spell of an evil HR siren?

By Pharma Giles

FORTUNE -- For Johnny B. Sinister, it was a humiliating moment. The CEO of Phoni, the world's largest imaginary pharmaceutical company, had been summoned to the BBC Television Studios in London, White City, on Saturday, Dec. 4, 2010, for a highly unusual purpose: to plead for his job on prime time TV programme “Dragon’s Den”.

Three stone-faced Dragons, acting on behalf of Phoni’s board, sat inside a drab recording studio as the Phoni CEO, trained as a trial lawyer, struggled to argue his business case. Alerted to this meeting less than 24 hours earlier, Sinister detailed his business plans, speaking non-stop for the better part of an hour. He touted his bold reorganizations, praised his administration's sweeping cost reductions, and rhapsodized about his outsourcing of Phoni’s crucial research-and-development operations.

But the three Dragons, Peter Jones, founder of Phones International; Theo Paphitis, Chairman of Ryman Stationary; and investment guru Deborah Meaden, weren't really there to debate Sinister’s business strategy.

The Dragons had spent a frantic week planning a TV special for the BBC on behalf of Phoni, where the Phoni CEO would be publicly questioned about his personal management of the multi-national pharmaceutical behemoth.

Indeed, a revolt had erupted against Sinister among a handful of senior Phoni managers, and the Dragons had been asked to figure out what was going on. One possibility: the usual attempt at an internal power grab. Another: a CEO who was unraveling.

Either scenario made good material for a national TV channel desperate for something diverting to fill its prime time airwaves.

Led by Jones, they confronted Sinister with questions about his management and his behaviour.

”Have you routinely berated subordinates?” asked Jones.

”Of course I damn well have!” snorted Sinister. Jones nodded approvingly.

”Have you really brought senior executives to tears?” questioned Paphitis.

”Damn right I have,” replied Sinister confidently. “Those goddamed pussies need to know who’s boss.” Paphitis smiled appreciatively.

”And how you respond to charges that your leadership style has been compromised by rumours of regular bondage sessions with the evil dominatrix that you appointed as your President of Global Human Resources?” asked Meaden, with a sly grin on her face.

“Shit,” said Sinister. “Look, those rumours are totally untrue, OK? But if they were true, which they aren't, what would be so wrong with a little light sado-masochism during office hours?” he countered. “A guy has to relax, doesn’t he?”

The Dragons sniggered.

A questioner of prosecutorial intensity, Sinister was used to being the interrogator. But this time he had to respond, and his answers seemed only to harden the Dragon’s uncompromising demeanour.

Sinister insisted that just two Phoni executives were truly unhappy. Most of his team thought he was a good boss and had done great things for the company.

That’s what Mary had told him, anyway.

“But pink fluffy handcuffs, Johnny?” asked Paphitis. “Even my lingerie shops don't sell tat like that. I’m not sure I can trust a man who’s rumoured to let his HR director handcuff him to his chair with pink fluffy handcuffs while she sits on his lap and puts her…

”I don’t think we need the details, Theo,” interrupted Deborah, glaring at Paphitis. “This is supposed to be a family show. I’m more interested in how Mr. Sinister thinks he can discover blockbuster medicines by axing half his R&D operation and completely demotivating the other half with innumerable direction changes and reorganisations…”

“Er…erm…” floundered Sinister, sweating heavily under the studio lights. It had all seemed so logical when Mary had first explained it to him. But this time, he wasn’t just facing his Board, his shareholders or a few Wall Street analysts. There would be no shouting or blustering his way out of this one...

“Well, I don’t know about you, Theo, Debbie, said Jones, “but I’m out,” cutting short Sinister’s rambling and incoherent explanation of his non-existent R&D strategy.

“So am I,” agreed Theo. “I’ve never heard of such an ill-conceived business case ever since we started this show...”

Deborah Meade looked at Johnny B. Sinister. The CEO of the world’s largest imaginary pharmaceutical company was dishevelled, panicked and confused. He looked at her imploringly.

“Sorry, Johnny, I’m out as well,” she said, after a while. “Or more to the point, you are…”

A day later, in an unusual Sunday night announcement, the 55-year-old CEO retired, effective immediately. Phoni's press release offered a surprisingly candid explanation, which was inserted by Sinister himself:

“The combination of meeting the requirements of our many shareholders around the world, not to mention those of my President of Human Resources, has made this period extremely demanding on me personally."

“I am excited at the opportunity to recharge my batteries, before the wires get re-applied to my – shit, you won’t print that last bit, will you?"

As revealing as it was, that statement only hinted at the turmoil inside Phoni (PHO). Indeed, what has occurred at the company -- whose $68 billion in annual sales are built on blockbuster drugs such as cholesterol medicine Lucrative and the infamous blue pill for erectile dysfunction, Priapic -- is extraordinary. Once a Wall Street darling and corporate icon, Phoni has tumbled into disarray.

In the decade that ended with Sinister's departure, its stock price sagged from a high of $49 down to $12 and its drug pipeline dried up (problems the company continues to grapple with today). Phoni lost its way, stumbling through a frantic series of zigzags in the hopes of finding new blockbusters to sustain its prodigious profits in the future.

More revelations next post, which are completely and utterly unrelated to a real world exposé…

Sand In My Face...

2011-08-01T19:01:00.002+01:00

I’m a huge fan of Laurie Ruettimann’s “Cynical Girl” blog. Laurie was an HRist for a pharma company we both used to work at, before her moral compass cut in and saved her from contracting the serious and permanent personality disorders that long term-pharma HRists always acquire – if they don’t start out with them in the first place.

Some quirks remain, however. Once an HRist, always an HRist I guess. At least with Laurie, such quirks are kind of endearing.

For instance, I like the way she can appear to hold two conflicting points of view simultaneously without the slightest outward trace of mental confusion or embarrassment. That’s a very necessary skill in big pharma HR, and yet you don’t often see it used for entertainment purposes the way Laurie can use it.

Case in point…

Last week, Laurie carried a lament from a senior female HRist who had gotten shit-faced at a works do and wound up snogging a junior male co-worker. The silly woman was bleating about how it might affect her career and whether she had “lost credibility,” and yet Laurie was quite sympathetic to her self-made plight.

Little consideration was given to the snoggee. How did such an event affect his career? Did he feel pressurised into intimacy because of the woman’s seniority? Or, because he was a man, was he just expected to laugh it all off? (Of course, had the poor sap been working in pharma, the HR lady who got drunk and ate his face would then subsequently have filed a grievance against him and the guy would have been out of the company, saving any subsequent awkwardness for her).

A post or so later, Laurie was then giving page inches to feminist Rebecca Watson and her tale of being cornered in an elevator by a guy at 4am and asked if she wanted to go back to his room.

Totally creepy behaviour by the guy in question for sure, which has (deliberately or otherwise) generated a lot of publicity for Ms. Watson.

Knowing nothing about Ms. Watson, I watched the said YouTube clip, fully expecting a pathetic whine about the unwanted advance and how all men are sexist and intimidating drone drone. In fact, she was quite matter of fact and rather grown-up about it, which kind of made the bile (see also some of the ugly comments left on the video) that was subsequently thrown at her somewhat puzzling.

Sure, she spouted a lot of boring piffle about atheism group get-togethers (which just seems to me like an alternative religion, given the self-important fanaticism of its proponents) and she did use the word “sexualise” (er, don’t all men do that?), but about getting propositioned, all the girl said was “please don’t hit on me in elevators at 4am, I find it scary”. That’s hardly unreasonable. Or particularly noteworthy.

But it really does seem that whilst inappropriate behaviour by men towards women is a big deal (e.g. men trying to hit on women at conferences), inappropriate behaviour by women towards men (e.g. women hitting on men at conferences) is viewed only from the women’s perspective.

The whole “harassment” thing between men and women is, of course, a mine-field, as this oldie but goodie shows…

All of which makes me think about lifts (or elevators, as you verbose Yanks call them. Actually, I do prefer the Yank noun for some reason).

You see, I live in continual fear of being thought creepy by women. The older I get, the worse that fear becomes. I have been living very happily with Mrs Giles for nearly thirty years and in all that time, I have never even thought about trying to “hit on” another woman. One's enough, thanks.

But I know that I also have this overactive sense of humour gland. And thanks to Laurie and Rebecca Watson, I am now acutely aware that a flippant, ill-thought out, clumsy or off-the-cuff remark could easily be misinterpreted as an attempt to “sexualise” a female listener.

Thus, I have now analysed the “lone woman in elevator scenario” very closely, using the conventional 5 x 5 risk analysis matrix.

So here I am, waiting for an elevator (that's not me in the picture background, I hasten to add). The elevator arrives at my floor. Inside there is a small, shrewish, nervous-looking woman (actually, her looks and demeanour aren’t important: I just thought I’d try and add a bit of local colour at this point). She is all alone. I get in the lift. The doors close.

Now if you take my word that I am not “creepy towards women”, then there are only (I think) nine basic possible scenarios from now on:

1) I smile at the girl and say “Hi”. She smiles back. We get out of the lift at our respective floors and instantly forget about each other (Likelihood 5: Impact 1 – Severity rating = 5)

2) I smile at the girl and say “Hi”. She asks me not to try and sexualise her and subsequently posts a YouTube video of her encounter with me using security video footage from the elevator that shows me talking to her and her shouting back. I am internationally humiliated and Mrs Giles files for divorce. (Likelihood 1: Impact 5 – Severity rating = 5)

3) I smile at the girl and say “Hi”. She smiles back and says that she thinks I am cute and asks me back to her room. I politely refuse. Rejected, she then accuses me of trying to sexualise her and subsequently posts a YouTube video of her encounter with me using security video footage from the elevator that shows me talking to her and her shouting back. I am internationally humiliated and Mrs Giles files for divorce. (Likelihood 1: Impact 5 – Severity rating = 5)

4) I get in the left and make no eye contact with the girl. We get out of the lift at our respective floors and instantly forget about each other. (Likelihood 5: Impact 1 – Severity rating = 5)

5) I get in the left and make no eye contact with the girl. She asks me why I am ignoring her. I apologise and say that I am wary of talking to strangers. She accuses me of rudeness and suggests that the real reason I am not talking to her is that I find her unattractive. I reply that that isn’t the case. She then asks me not to try and sexualise her and subsequently posts a YouTube video of her encounter with me using security video footage from the elevator that shows me talking to her and her shouting back. I am internationally humiliated and Mrs Giles files for divorce. (Likelihood 1: Impact 5 – Severity rating = 5)

6, 7 and 8) As per 2), 3) or 5), but a YouTube video is not made. Nevertheless, I am mortified that my behaviour has been deemed toxic and I feel embarrassed and humiliated. (Likelihood 1: Impact 4 – Severity rating = 4)

9) I smile at the girl and say “Hi”. She smiles back and says that she thinks I am cute and asks me back to her room. I politely refuse. She accepts the reply. We get out of the lift at our respective floors, she feeling slightly hurt and I feeling somewhat perplexed (Likelihood 1: Impact 3 – Severity rating = 3

So as you can see, out of nine possible scenarios, only two have no significant impact for me.

Logically, I therefore have to conclude that (even considering the severity rating weighting) I only have a 20-30% chance of escaping accusations of harassment if I get into a lift with a lone woman. Those are not good odds.

I will therefore never use an elevator again, no matter how tall the building.

So thanks, Laurie and Rebecca. As a result of your insights, I will be getting much more exercise, and as a result I will be slimmer, fitter and healthier.

Modern feminism. It’s a win-win for both sexes.

Charles Atlas, eat your heart out…

...And Finally This Week...

2011-07-28T20:13:00.000+01:00

Master Giles, my young son, is on his school summer holidays. Having been brought up in an age of CDs and MP3 players, he has been fascinated to learn that music can also be stored on discs of black plastic, to be subsequently "downloaded" by use of a rotating turntable and a pick-up.

Although it took him somewhat longer to learn to use our record player than it did to master the music software on his computer, he is now going through the Giles household collection of ancient vinyl, transferring anything that takes his fancy on to a remarkable device he owns, apparently called an "iPod".

Among the various album covers strewn across the study floor was an original copy of Elvis Presley's first LP from 1956 (called simply "Elvis Presley"), left to me by my late father.

This is not a choice I would have expected, especially as the lad has quite commendably zeroed in on my New Wave collection, becoming enamoured with the music of the Sex Pistols, Buzzcocks, The Stranglers, 999 etc.

I picked up the Elvis album from the floor by the computer where he was seated, doing something arcane to the audio curve of Killing Joke's "Change."

"So you like Elvis?" I asked him.

"Some of it's OK," he replied, waving a non-committal hand. High praise indeed.

"So what's your favourite track?" I asked him, as I put the record back into its cover.

Master Giles became thoughtful. "The Wurlitzer Song," he said after a while, a very serious expression on his face.

"Eh? Don't know that one."

I'm not a huge Elvis fan but I was pretty sure he'd never done one about a jukebox...

"Oh, come on, Dad," he said, still serious. "You know the one..."

Very good. And deadpan, too. That's my boy...

And if I have to explain it, it won't be funny...

And on that note, have a great weekend folks...

Giles.

Worth A Fortune...

2011-07-28T19:25:00.000+01:00

"Must read" stuff from Fortune magazine on the decline and fall of Pfizer's Jeff Kindler...

I was planning to write a Gormenghast Fantasy Christmas Special along these lines, but Fortune have beaten me to it with something from real life!

I particularly enjoyed the revelations about "Scary" Mary McCleod (she of helicommuting fame), which pretty much reinforces my view of the type of person that characterises Big Pharma HR...

What a way to run a major pharma company...

Hat tip: all major pharma blogs...

Saving The Nation...

2011-07-27T21:16:00.002+01:00

Glaxo CEO Single-Handedly Saves British Economy

Drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline said on Tuesday it would bring more jobs to Britain, taking advantage of tax changes and delivering good news in an economy where recovery remains fragile.

"We expect over the next several years to be increasing our activity in the UK," Chief Executive Andrew Witty told reporters after the group released its second-quarter earnings on Tuesday.

"However, this is only because the current UK government is giving us lots of tax breaks and are caving in over drug pricing and the influence of NICE," Witty said, in between personally saving millions of sick children in Africa, winning marathons and leaping tall buildings with a single bound.

GSK's vote of confidence will be welcomed by government ministers, who are handing out massive tax breaks and otherwise pathetically grovelling to any multi-national in the vain and desperate hope of keeping jobs in the UK. The country's economy barely grew between April and June and industrial output shrank.

It also comes after Britain's scientific jobs base was dealt a major blow in February when Pfizer, the world's biggest drugmaker, said it would close its research and development centre in Sandwich in southern England after not being allowed to cede from the UK, proclaim independence and enslave the local population.

Witty said GSK had already started to bring manufacturing activities that had been off-shored to India back to the UK, and a new factory located in either Cumbria, County Durham or Scotland would employ an additional 500 people.

"That’s only because of financial incentives that currently make Scottish labour cheaper than Chinese," he said.

However, Witty blatantly threatened that any insistence on further cuts to drug prices could make the UK less attractive as a base for pharmaceuticals manufacturing and research.

"There's a real balance to be struck between maintaining some sort of democratic dignity and cravenly sucking up to big business by caving in to corporate blackmail to outsource jobs to the Far East, just like our HR department is planning to do anyway," he said.

"I think the UK has that balance pretty well in our favour at the moment. So just remember who’s boss, Dave. Any whiff of regulation and it’s “bye bye Britain, hello Beijing…"

News International outlets seem curiously quiet about Saint Witty’s latest proclamations, although other organs seem to be painting the usual sycophantic picture. Perhaps GSK’s non-executive media mogul director has other things on his mind…

Hear No Evil...

2011-07-26T20:59:00.006+01:00

"An in-depth senior management investigation into the failure of GMPs at beleaguered pharmaceutical behemoth Hampton & Hampton has found no evidence of incompetence at boardroom level" said CEO Bill Wobegone.

"All of our production problems were down to useless employees, and not anything to do with me or my boardroom colleagues," Welldone announced.

"Our brilliant cost-cutting measures in getting rid of our QA staff have been thoroughly vindicated. After all, if the one QA guy that is left can't get it right, it shows how bad the hundreds we got rid of must have been."

"The quality of this investigation just proves that I am indeed worth every cent of my enormous salary, and maintains the tradition of pharmaceutical CEO non-accountability" concluded Halfbaked.

"It's Florida holiday villas all round..."

Tales of a similarly not-at-all self-serving "investigation" can be found in the real world...

Pfizer's Latest Employee Deal...

2011-07-25T21:56:00.000+01:00

Along these lines..?

Thanx to Master Giles...

...And Finally This Week...

2011-07-21T21:30:00.000+01:00

For GSK CEO Andrew Witty...

And on that note, have a great weekend, folks...

Giles...

Read All About It...

2011-07-21T21:16:00.001+01:00

What you WON'T be reading in your Super Soaraway Sunday Sun...

Story...

A Black And White Situation...

2011-07-21T19:11:00.001+01:00

FDA's Woodcook-Cuppe: "Yeah but Nah but Yeah but..."

Last October, a government watchdog group urged the FDA to change the labelling for the Saloadatat antipsychotic because the Phoni drug was being prescribed - along with methadone - to treat US military personnel with post-traumatic stress disorder. The Project On Government Oversight (POGO) argued that the combination may increase the risk of a methadone overdose, and cited FDA adverse event reports and a 2007 study that found Saloadatat significantly increases plasma levels of methadone.

In April, the FDA’s Janet Woodcock-Cuppe addressed this dilemma, decisively stating the FDA’s definitive position on Saloadatat/Methadone interactions as follows:

“After assessment of our evaluations, we believe that a potentially dangerous interaction involving Saloadatat and methadone is unlikely. Therefore, no further agency action is indicated. Unless it turns out that there are interactions, in which case we will insist on labelling changes...”

“But we think that’s still unlikely, so we won’t. However, just to be on the safe side, label changes have now been made. Not that these changes have been made because we think there is a danger of interaction between Saloadatat and other drugs. Even if that’s what the label now says. Because there isn’t.”

“But to reflect our over-riding concerns on patient safety, we have insisted on label changes. Even though there’s no risk. Although it’s possible that there may be. Although any risk is highly unlikely to be significant. Even though we’ve insisted on label changes. Which normally would only be made if we thought there were significant risks. Which in this case, there aren’t. Even though the labelling has been changed to reflect exactly the risks POGO asked us to, but which we think really aren’t significant. Possibly. Or then again, possibly not... ”

“We hope that this statement clarifies the FDA’s position. Or not…”

STOP PRESS:

An increase in pedestrian fatalities at level crossings has been linked to an earlier FDA decision that black may be similar to white. Although it may not be. Possibly…

A firm hand on the FDA’s tiller has also been evidenced in the real world…

Thanks to Paul Thacker of POGO….

The Dilemma Of St. Andrew...

2011-07-18T22:46:00.031+01:00

The Dilemma of St. Andrew

1And it came to pass that the House of Murdoch, Lords of News International, mightiest of the World’s media organisations, became beset by the scandal of the hacking of the phones.

2For indeed, some of the filth that for many years, the House of Murdoch has been throwing in pursuit of profit didst suddenly stick to them.

3Yea verily didst those not of the House of Murdoch gain great satisfaction from its discomfiture, and did clamour for the banishment of the Mighty Rupert and his family from their positions of great power and influence.

4Sheepish indeed were those politicians and businessmen who had sought favour from the House of Murdoch, and had suck-ed up to them, and indeed had positioned themselves at a great depth within the very fundament of the Mighty Rupert himself, so as to gain favourable publicity from the thunderous organs of the Lords of News International, such as the Sunday Times, The Sun and yea even the News of the World.

5And none were more sheepish than Saint Andrew of Witty.

6For now even the financial press had finally come to realise that Brother James of Murdoch, First Born Son of the Mighty Rupert, didst indeed sit at the right hand of St Andrew, as a Non-Executive Director on the Board of GSK.

7And well had Brother James served him, for verily had he seen to it that St Andrew was depicted as a great philanthropist and patriot, even though his vaccines were unwholesome, his pay-rises exhorbitant and his HR Director was sneakily shipping UK jobs to the Far East.

8Yet Brother Murdoch was now tainted with the whiff of scandal, and thus a clamour did arise, seeking his banishment so that GSK would not seem tarnished with the wickedness of News International.

9So it was with a heavy heart that St Andrew didst summon Brother James to appear before him.

10And St Andrew thus didst speak unto Brother James, saying that he was now Bad News, and should thus resign as a non-executive director, and should go forth.

11Yet loudly didst Brother James laugh at this request. “Do you forget that I know where the Bodies Are Buried?” he didst ask St Andrew. “For many are the phones we have hacked, and the e-mails we have copies of. And indeed, many are the tales we have of Seroxat, and of Avandia, and of their marketing and their clinical trials…”

12And deeply did St Andrew ponder the words of Brother James.

13Thus it was that Brother James was redeemed in the eyes of St Andrew, and remained at his right hand, and yea, even with an enhanced bonus.

14And yea verily, it came to pass that St Rebekah of Brooks didst even become GSK’s Director of Communications…

15For St Andrew knew what side his bread was buttered.

Seems the blogs and media are finally waking up to A Certain Presence on the Board of GSK. Can’t see what the fuss is myself - they seem made for each other…

...And Finally This Week...

2011-07-15T22:59:00.001+01:00

An early blast from the Buzzcocks - with Howard Devoto (who went on to Magazine) on vocals...

Shows what can be done with a no-frills approach. And talent.

And on that note, have a great weekend, folks...

Giles

That's The Way To Do It...

2011-07-14T21:39:00.001+01:00

Spare a thought for employees of Forest laboratories, one of the few medium-sized pharma companies that haven't been gobbled up and trashed by the likes of Pfizer or Sanofi - yet...

83 year-old Howard Solomon has been the patriarchal CEO of Forest since 1977 and a part of the company since 1964. Some of the Forest Board have roots with Forest that are equally as deep. These guys aren't the typical sort of modern "slash, loot and run" execs that have eviscerated pharma companies elsewhere.

Forest have been reasonably immune from the lemming-like mass lay-offs and R&D closures that have characterised the modern pharma fad for short term cost-cutting and quick financial gains for investors at the expense of long-term R&D programming. The continuity at Board level provided by the example of Solomon must have a lot to do with this.

And unlike most pharma companies these days, Forest indeed looks like it has a neat little product portfolio that could largely offset impending "best seller" patent expiries.

I would content that this moderate success has been achieved not just by shrewd in-licensing, but by also providing a degree of stability and security for their staff, such that employees can worry about actually doing their jobs rather than just hanging on to them.

It seems to be paying off.

But the smell of money in the water generated by a healthy R&D portfolio has, sure enough, attracted the usual shoal of "slash and burn" corporate raiders, with Carl Icahn leading the pack of sharks looking to rip up Forest for a quick cash in.

Icahn and his like have no interest in providing the sort of stable, patriarchal kind of corporate atmosphere that allows R&D to flourish. They only want mega-bucks for themselves and their backers, and they want them NOW. Long-term R&D programmes, innovative new medicines and the loyalty of the research staff that invent them mean nothing to them. Icahn and his creatures fit in well with the ranks of most other modern pharma execs.

So I really hope Mr. Solomon and his board succeed in fighting off the predators. Forest employees (along with everyone else) know that the old boy is a huckster, but at least he's THEIR huckster.

His stake in the company is probably as emotional as it is financial and for the sake of his employees, I hope he and his Board get to hang on to it...

The usually excellent Jim Edwards may not care much for Howard Soloman's "God Complex", but for once I think he's a tad off target...

The Revenge of The Mummy...

2011-07-12T22:00:00.000+01:00

Is Solomon Falling Apart? Forest Labs Spends $316K On Stuffing Him

Forest Labs has spent $316,638 on medical expenses for its 600-year-old CEO, up from $56,571 in 2010. The company’s proxy disclosure did not say what was wrong with Howard Solomon. UPDATE: A spokesperson for the company said:

“Mr. Solomon has no ongoing medical conditions that would impair his ability to continue functioning as the Company’s CEO. This is because he has, in fact, been dead for the last two hundred years. A good portion of last year’s expenses were related to the purchase of additional bandages and the spiraling cost of embalming fluid, due to his unfortunate and accidental exposure to daylight….”

Solomon’s preservation is a crucial issue for Forest. A CEO being dead can sometimes count as a material event that requires disclosure to the SEC. Solomon is fighting to retain his place atop the company against both investor Carl Icahnhascheezburger, who wants to end the Solomon dynasty at Forest and install his own family as Forest’s ruling clique, and the Department of Health & Human Services, which wants to exclude Forest’s Pharaoh from the drug business as a punishment for the company settling a $313 million investigation by the Department of Justice over pyramid selling offences.

The company said in April it might consider Solomon stepping aside as the company figurehead. But Solomon’s advanced state of decay, his high preservation bills, the fight with Icahnt and the litigation all suggest his final interrment may be sooner rather than later.

500 years at Forest

The end of the Solomon dynasty will be a culture shock at Forest, as Reuters noted.

Due to being deceased, Solomon remains virtually invisible to Wall Street. He tends not to speak on earnings calls or at investor conferences; one analyst recalls meeting him just once in 17 years, and then only though the auspices of a medium. Nevertheless, the Emperor Solomon is deeply identified with the company he has ruled over since 1677.

His 330-year run as CEO is merely the half of it. Solomon has been a member of the ruling Forest dynasty since 1520 — nearly 500 years. (He’s not the oldest member of Forest’s ruling caste - Reuters added that 840-year-old William Candee has served as High Priest since 1459.)

Here’s how Solomon’s medical bills have increased over the last few years.

2011: $316,638: complete rebandage and embalming fluid replacement
2010: $305,571: death mask refurbishment
2009: $280,000: improved security at tomb to prevent robbers
2008: $250,000: removal of vital organs and storage in earthenware jars

In this age of disposable pharmaceutical CEOS, who do five year tours of duty and then “retire” with massive pay-offs having achieved nothing, the durability of Forest’s CEO is perhaps to be commended. His company will undoubtedly miss him…

...And Finally This Week...

2011-07-08T20:34:00.001+01:00

For no reason whatsover, I was recently reminded that 99% of gargoyles look like Bob Todd...

And on that note, have a great weekend folks...

Giles...

Selling Off The Silver...

2011-07-08T20:22:00.000+01:00

Phoni Spinoffs Will Be Prelude To A Bigger Breakup, Analyst Insists

Jul. 7 2011 -
By MATTHEW HERPES

Phoni will spin out or sell off its animal health and baby formula businesses, the drug giant says. The move will result in $24 billion or more being given to shareholders and to buy back shares to artificially inflate the price prior to Phoni Senior Executives offloading their options.

But Phoni said it will keep two other divisions that could be worth a combined $46 billion, as nobody in their right mind would ever buy them.

Some investors had hoped that these divisions – the established products business that sells generic drugs in international markets and the consumer health division – might actually make some serious money one day.

The idea was that new chief executive Ian McGreed would then break the company up into five pieces so that the drug division would be get taken over by Sanofi or Lilly.

So is that option now off the table? No, says Jami Dodger at Goldberg Suchs, who was one of the first analysts to start pushing for a Phoni breakup in 2008. Phoni is now a client of Goldman, and has been in thrall to its advisors for the past 12 months.

“Our engineering of the slashing of Phoni's R&D program has been a great first step,” says Dodger. “After all, what’s the point in putting money into developing a portfolio of products for tomorrow when we financial gurus can steal that cash for personal enrichment today?”

“Ultimately, what we are ordering Ian McGreed to do is break up the whole company into five separate, distinct businesses. This is the easiest way to unlock vast brokerage fees for Goldberg Suchs.”

She says that these were the obvious divisions to cash in on first, given that they actually make money. Animal health is a large business (annual sales $3.9 billion) that can stand on its own. Nutration (Phoni’s $1.9 billion baby formula business) is the division investors have most wanted Phoni to spin off, so that they can cash in on its assets.

The biggest move would be to spin off the Established Products generics business. Anders Timotherson at Beerstein Research, who had also written that Phoni might take dramatic steps toward a breakup, called breaking off the established markets division “really the only innovative part to the commercial suicide pact CEO Ian McGreed is considering.” But Dodger says it is too soon to break off that unit, because it is still too big to get bought out by generics giants like Teva or Mylan.

“Another couple of years of Phoni mismanagement should see its value reduced to where a buy-out would be likely. This isn’t the end of Phoni’s collapse,” Rubin says. “This is the very beginning.”

In a note to investors, Beerstein’s Timotherson suggested that “some investors may be disappointed that Phoni is not going the full distance and selling off everything now.”

However, he kept an ‘Outperform’ rating on Phoni because of new medicines such as crituzibank (lung cancer) and nofukingud (rheumatoid arthritis) and increased usage of the Provenot vaccine in adults. He says the Phoni has “perhaps the most over-hyped late-stage pipeline of the different drug companies we cover, and we want to sustain that hype for our own gain...”

News from the real world shows that the angular momentum of the death spiral of what used to be the world’s largest pharmaceutical company is increasing day by day...

Hat-tip Pharmagossip

Polonium Sandwich Anyone...?

2011-07-06T23:10:00.000+01:00

An Investigative Committee team has conducted a search in the Moscow offices of pharmaceutical multi-national Phoni Pharm, an Interior Ministry source said today.

”Phoni Pharmaceuticals has an international reputation as a Special Executive for Corruption, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion,” said Senior Investigative Committee Officer Vladimir Kalashnikov. “A worldwide network of illegal activities combined with a ruthless elimination of any resistance, internal or external, to its organisation are used by a ruling elite of oligarchs to maintain their positions of vast personal wealth, power and influence.”

“So we thought it would be worth raiding Phoni’s offices to see if we could steal any business tips from them…”

Completely unrelated tales reach us from the real world.

Pot and Kettle...

2011-07-06T22:53:00.000+01:00

Ex Phoni Executive Pot Calls Phoni Kettle Black

Over the past few years, Phoni has made news not for startling discoveries, but instead for slashing key areas of R&D, closing facilities and laying off thousands of employees, whilst its executives enjoy exorbitant salaries and perks (such as use of a fleet of luxury company jets), all against a background of declining product sales, failed acquisitions and massive fines for illegal marketing.

Stepping into this maelstrom is John LaMentable, who was the Phoni R&D chief from 2004 to 2007, when he was forced to walk the plank into early retirement. He left a few months after the spectacular failure of the once-heralded tellizanfib cholesterol pill, which was supposed to be revolutionary by raising HDL, the good cholesterol, but instead caused heart attacks and deaths, causing a Phase III trial to be aborted.

The flame out triggered subsequent massive R&D cuts, the viciousness of which has surprised LaMentable.

“How can a company expect to discover new medicines if it destroys a large chunk of its own R&D and completely demoralises what’s left?” he asks.

"It's not surprising Phoni is failing, when it chooses to get rid of a genius like me. How dare they!?"

LaMentable is now a senior partner at PureShiteVentures, a venture capital firm aimed at parting the credulous from their money,

“I don’t think people have recognized the impact that getting rid of incredibly useless senior R&D executives like me, and then replacing them with even more incredibly useless ones, has had on R&D organizations and R&D productivity,” he says.

“When you have just about every company in the industry doing this, it really jolts the situation quite a bit.”

Not in the least bit hypocritical tales of failed executive post-valedictory "I told you so"s may also be found in the real world...

Smoke and Mirrors...

2011-07-05T21:18:00.001+01:00

New Study Links Smoking Drug to Cardiovascular Problems

Phoni has suffered something of a jolt with the news that even US regulators are now finally looking into reports of suicides, psychosis, depression and now, cardiovascular problems, in patients who have taken the firm’s smoking cessation product Frantix.

As part of an ongoing safety review, the US Food and Drug Administration is evaluating post-marketing data submitted by Phoni and says that “a preliminary assessment reveals that much of the data seems to have been massaged to camouflage many cases reflecting the onset of suicidal depression, psychotic paranoia, blindness, sterility and voting Republican within hours of initiating Frantix (Nocandecline) treatment”.

Drowsiness also investigated

In one instance, a Frantix patient was shot in the head by his neighbour as he tried to plant a nuclear detonator under his house. Fortunately, being a Frantix patient, the bullet missed the patient’s brain by three feet and he soon recovered once he stopped taking the drug. The FDA has asked Phoni for additional cases that might be similar and is also evaluating reports of chronic narcolepsy in patients taking Frantix, somewhat affecting their ability to drive or operate machinery.

In response, Phoni have sent envelopes containing references (and remains) of patients who fell asleep whilst operating power presses and industrial waste compressors.

The agency has urged healthcare professionals to monitor patients on the drug for changes in behaviour and mood, but is quick to note that “the role of Frantix in these cases is not clear because smoking has always been associated with underlying psychiatric illness. After all, you surely have to be mentally ill to do something to yourself that is proven beyond all doubt to be highly addictive and damaging to your health in the first place?”

Hear No Evil…

Since its launch five years ago, Frantix has proved to be one of the few successful recent drugs for Phoni. A company spokesman, Bob Bobbington-Bobsworth, pointed out that “in clinical trials involving more than 5,000 patients, adverse events related to changes in behaviour or psychiatric symptoms, including suicides, hallucinations and psychosis, were statistically proven by us to have occurred at a rate comparable to placebo-treated patients. OK, so we used LSD as a placebo, but so what, punks? Moreover, in the studies there were no actual suicides, and this reflects well on the standard of straightjackets used by the patients on trial. So that’s all right, then. Overall, we aren’t aware of a single instance that can establish a relationship between Frantix and any reported events. And we intend to remain that way. Pass that bucket of sand, will you?

”Smoking is known to cause a host of associated lung and cardiovascular diseases,” added Bobbington-Bobsworth, “and we’re proud that Frantix can offer the smoker a wider range of self-inflicted health risks, such as psychosis, paranoia, depression and weight gain, as well as the old favourites such as cardiovascular disease…”

President of Phoni’s global marketing division, Rich Pillager, said that “it was unfortunate that some people were so quick to criticise one the few recently successful products of the US pharmaceutical industry.”

“We don’t think that such people have the best interests of Phoni, and therefore the US economy as a whole, at heart. After all, what’s a few deaths in comparison to upholding the principle of the free market?” Pillager asks.

“As a company with a major money-spinner to defend, we’ve therefore taken the initiative to actively and aggressively counteract any bad publicity wherever it occurs. We’ve employed agencies to scan the media, particularly the Internet, and to put up counter-publicity disguised as comment by private individuals on sites wherever anyone posts anything negative about our product. We think it’s essential that people get to see a balanced view of the risks and benefits associated with any hugely profitable life-style drug such as Frantix,” says Pillager.

For tales for yet more problems for a controversial lifetsyle medicine from the real world, go here and here...

Excel and Exceed...

2011-07-01T11:59:00.000+01:00

Phoni CEO Ian "Jock" McGreed today defended his choice of company song.

"I think it's essential that a company such as Phoni has an anthem that reminds both our employees and our customers just why we're in the healthcare business," he said.

"That’s been sung hundreds of times a year. Every single one of our administrators that runs our centers comes in for professional development every year … we sing them that song."

"Some people think it’s ridiculous but it gets everyone’s attention. They say, Woah, these guys are either bizarre or they’re serious or both. One of the two. We start executive meetings by singing this song. It’s exceedingly uncomfortable for lots of people. What does it achieve? It achieves that people know this is a very conscious thing. Doesn’t mean it’s sincere. But it really puts it out there."

"I also expect employees to dance for me..."

Tales of a galaxy-sized CEO ego reach us from the real world...

Stalinist Purges...

2011-06-30T21:26:00.001+01:00

With immaculate timing, Pfizer announce an R&D "collaboration" with a Russian venture capital firm, at just the same time that half of the Pharmaceutical Sciences division at Pfizer's UK Gormenghast-on-Sea R&D complex will be finding out whether they will be spared as a result of the U-turn on total site closure.

Some 300 of the 600-odd Pharm Sci folks there will still now be out on their ears by November, it seems...

Fancy a relocation package to Siberia, comrades...?

Actually, compared to Thanet...

Can I Fix It? Yes Icahn...

2011-06-29T21:43:00.000+01:00

Billionaire corporate raider and asset-stripper Carl Icahnascheezburger has taken a large stake in Forest Bide-A-Wee Rest Homes For Elderly Pharmaceutical Executives Inc and plans to nominate four directors to its board as the U.S. pharma executive care home deals with the cost of keeping its aging residents in the style to which they have become accustomed.

Forest disclosed Icahnascheezburger’s 6.5 percent stake and nominations to its nine-member board on Monday, and its shares rose 2 percent.

”Our value-destroying old man is far more destructive than their value-destroying old man,” an Icahnascheezburger spokesman said. “We therefore think it’s time for Soloman to go.”

But some analysts say Forest’s most elderly resident, Chief Executive Howard Solomon (83) has failed to outline a convincing strategy to shore up its business ahead of impending patent expirations for its antidepressant Lexapro and Alzheimer's medicine Namenda.

"The Forest executive team itself already accounts for most of the sales of Namenda," Punxsutawny Financial Group analyst Gary Bachmanturneroverdrive said.

Analysts speculated that Icahnascheezburger could push for more aggressive cost cuts or deal-making, or seek share buybacks, but a sale of the drugmaker was seen as most likely.

Icahnascheezburger has been instrumental in several shake-downs in the healthcare industry of late, obtaining seats on the board at several small, inventive pharmaceutical companies and then turning them into takeover fodder for larger ones.

With a market value of $11 billion, Forest is a mid-size drugmaker that makes an attractive “strip-out and sell-on” target for Icahnascheezburger.

The timing of Icahnascheezburger's move also coincides with the usual pre-emptive mud-slinging at CEO Solomon, following a $313 million company settlement last year for improper marketing and distribution of its drugs.

Icahnascheezburger's affiliated entity, High Stakes Limited Partnership, will nominate Alexander Icahnascheezburger, Richard Icahnascheezburger, Lucian Icahnascheezburger and Eric Icahnascheezburger to Forest's board at its 2011 meeting.

"While we have not yet had a chance to meet with Mr. Icahnascheezburger to discuss his ideas for the company, we welcome constructive input from any of our shareholders who would prefer Mr. Icahnascheezburger to fuck off," Solomon said in a statement.

”Mr. Icahnascheezburger is just a mere young whippersnapper. He’s only 75 years old, for Chrissakes. That’s no age at all. You need to be at least 80 to run a pharmaceutical company, like I am…”

”Or at least, that’s what I think I do. I struggle to remember things like that these days, don’t I, Nurse? Time for my Namenda again, is it? I’m 83, you know…”

Analysts said they were not surprised that Forest would be a target of investor activism despite the recent strong performance of the stock, which has risen 60 percent in the past year.

“We’re not interested in actual performance or long-term company prospects,” said Bachmanturneroverdrive. “What we want is instant short-term profits from asset-stripping deals NOW!!!. That’s what being a stock-market analyst is all about…”

Forest acquired Clinical Data Inc earlier this year for $1.2 billion to get access to the newly approved Viibryd antidepressant. It has also recently won approval for respiratory drug Daliresp and antibiotic Teflaro and has other drugs in late-stage development for conditions such as irritable bowel syndrome and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

"But we don’t care. Analysts like me don’t understand R&D pipelines, so therefore they can’t be important," Bachmanturneroverdrive said.

“All that matters is that Icahnascheezburger buys out Forest, trashes R&D, shuts down its manufacturing and then sells it on at a massive profit, just like he has for every other pharmaceutical company he’s been involved with…”

In the real world, it’s looking like the same old story. Over-hyped corporate investment shark swallows medium-sized parochial pharma company and another load of pharmaceutical R&D workers get the bullet.

Result? Billionaires net more billions while scientists get thrown on the scrapheap, leaving even fewer researchers to meet the challenges of finding new medicines...

Will someone explain to me again how this capitalism thing benefits the human race?

...And Finally This Week...

2011-06-24T19:46:00.000+01:00

Pfizer's screeching U-turn on the total closure of Gormenghast-On-Sea illustrates just how ill-thought out and rushed the decision was in the first place.

It provides even more evidence of a new CEO who was desperate to discredit the old one, irrespective of any actual cost or reality - a reality which has now caught up with the senior management there, big time.

Pfizer made the "strategic decision" (aka short-sighted cost-saving measure), long ago, to put all of its late phase development eggs into the Sandwich basket by closing its US Groton Pilot Plant, leaving its hi-tech, high-cost, low-throughput plaything at Sandwich as the only in-house source of late phase drug substance.

And try as they might, Pfizer have, completely unsurprisingly, been unable to persuade anyone to take on that work or that wasteful and extravagant facility for them, despite all of the bullish boasting, huffing and puffing coming from the management team there.

A Pfizer spokeman told the UK Independent that:

"After a rigorous diligence process, Pfizer determined that retaining a portion of its pharmaceutical sciences operation at Sandwich presents the best solution at this time for Pfizer's business..."

...which translated, means...

"...all of the CROs we talked to took one look at the overheads and laughed at us, so the only way can can carry on with our mid- to late-phase development programmes is to keep pouring money into Sandwich, at least for the next couple of years until the trials get wound up or we find a CRO somewhere else we can outsource it all to. Drat. And Double Drat..."

One wonders how these spokemen can be so full of shit. But then an ex-Pfizerite sent me a video showing me where the site restaurant gets its burgers from...

That would be completely consistent with Pfizer policy of rejecting a simple solution (such as using real meat) in favour of something hi-tech and utterly pointless at twenty times the price and that ultimately, is just complete shit...

And on that somewhat queasy note, have a great weekend, folks...

Giles...

A Stay of Execution...

2011-06-23T20:46:00.001+01:00

Phoni Site Head Banished As Pharma Giant Forced To Keep Development Labs Open

Dr. Ruth McKlosedown has been relieved of her position as Site Manager at Phoni's Nether Wallop site following her botched attempts to make all of the scientists there redundant.

"We do not tolerate failure in this organisation" said Annette Ghastly OBE, Worldwide Head of Phoni Pharmaceutical Sciences, as she stroked her trademark long-haired white cat. "Her incompetence in announcing the closure of our development function before finding a contract research organisation to take over their work is unacceptable."

"She will be punished by the usual method reserved for failed senior managers, i.e. banished to a head up a satellite site which will then be closed, forcing her to accept a massive severance pay-off."

Dr. Ghastly will assume control of the Nether Wallop site herself.

"If you want a job doing properly, sometimes you have to do it yourself," she said.

"The company will continue to try and outsource our Pharm. Sci. function, as part of the company's ulimate aim to concentrate on its core skills, which are hostile takeovers, shafting employees and illegal marketing. Until then, the laboratory and Pilot Plant will remain open despite their monstrous running costs, humiliating though that is..."

Local MP Cynthia Knee-Trembler was delighted.

"I take sole credit for this climb-down, thereby proving to my constituents that I am not ineffectual and useless like everyone is saying," she boasted. "I get to claim that saving 300 jobs out of 3,000 is a massive boost for the local economy, which should see me all right when it comes to getting a cushy government job as a reward for saving political face..."

Excellent news reaches us from Gormenghast-On-Sea, albeit a victory of a Pyrrhic nature (and possibly a temporary one). Having the only Pilot Plant in the company (hi-tech, hi-cost white elephant though it is) has probably saved Pharm. Sci. Sandwich - for now...

Punk's Not Dead...?

2011-06-22T21:52:00.000+01:00

It was good to catch up with my old colleague, Peter Cook, founder of Human Dynamics, Dean of the Academy of Rock and author of two best-selling management guides, Best Practice Creativity (the serious one) and Sex, Leadership and Rock’n’Roll (the other serious one).

Peter got in touch with me recently to say he was planning to launch a third book, in the shape of freebie e-dition, and kindly sent me a draft of it.

Now I really don’t care too much for “HR theory and practice” as a choice of reading matter but, (as is often the way with Mr. Cook) he has as a way of engaging your interest and holding it. By whatever means necessary.

This is a neat trick in the age of Twitter and Facebook (and the associated short, shouty attention spans) and a cluttered market of truly awful, lazy and over-hyped “management guides” such as “the One Minute Manager” (all management is just ‘common sense’, so you don’t actually need to bother making any long-term effort to learn any management skills…) and “Who Moved My Cheese?” (employees are just ‘little people’ who should never argue against random and capricious change and must NEVER ask big questions, such as ‘Why I am stuck in a fucking maze looking for fucking cheese?’…) that have done so much to turn modern managers into the smug, functionally useless bunch of MBA-ridden twats that they undoubtedly are.

So I read through it, non-managerial HR-hater that I am.

And I have to say that I was impressed.

Actually, I don’t have to say that at all, but I did. Just then. See?

Peter has stuck with his trademark theme of mixing messages from popular music with his insights into the morass that is “people management”. What you’ll get in his e-book is a classic New Wave approach in a series of short, sharp vignettes of blinding common sense covering topics such as hiring, firing and all of the bits in between that “modern managers” usually contract out to HR – who often use it all as an excuse to “power trip”…

The delight in Peter’s latest writing is that you can read it in bite-sized chunks and then say to yourself, “that’s bleedin’ obvious” - just before you realise that it often takes a bleedin’ genius to spot the bleedin’ obvious...

HR and “People Management” is a subject so mired in its own self-serving, self-perpetuating bullshit that you just know professional HR associations such as the CIPD and their members are going to HATE this book.

And that has to be a good thing. It cuts through typical HR bullshit like a knife through Johnny Rotten’s Country Life butter.

Now the score between Peter and myself on books successfully published is “Peter Cook 2, Giles 0,” (3-0 if you count his OU work). I therefore did not feel qualified to offer any advice to him on its content, despite one or two minor disagreements on his observations.

But what really bothered me was his working title: “Punk Rock HR”. Ugh. Nooooo.

Everyone knows that Punk Rock is dead. These days, “Punk Rock” is just a clapped-out and over-used adjective for anything that wants to be considered as “daring” or “revolutionary” but is usually just a cover for a duff idea with no depth. Look at old Johnny Rotten in the aforementioned cheesy (or buttery) ad to see what a sell-out the idea of “Punk Rock” has become (not that JR isn’t way smart enough to know that, of course).

I put this view to Peter.

He thought about it and said that I might have a point, and that we needed to drink about it.

So we sat down soon after, face to face in an agreeable nearby pub, and talked it over.

Pete was keen on the “Punk Rock” reference because, like me, he was old enough to remember the galvanising effect the advent of “Punk Rock” had on the Seventies music scene.

Twenty minute, self-indulgent drum solos from Yes or ELP were swept away by two minute blasts of raw energy. Although “Punk” swiftly degenerated into an excuse for a lot of sociopathic behaviour (which maybe fits with the concept of modern HR – ‘we can do what we like and FUCK you’), it did clear the way for the broader “New Wave” of music that immediately followed it.

His thinking is that what modern HR needs is a similar sort of revolution, and his book is inextricably linked with the tunes of the times that reflected that desire for change.

I could see what he was saying but still felt that “Punk Rock HR” was just a crap title.

Pete rather likes those strong bottled Belgian beers.

He told me the tale of why he quit “HR proper” and set up on his own.

After tiring of the “dead man’s shoes” aspect of promotion opportunities in a stable (and therefore successful) pharmaceutical company, he sold his soul and moved into corporate HR. Because of his science background, he was (unwillingly) set to become the HR “partner” for a Nobel-Prize-winning researcher and his team.

Unfortunately, as Peter explained, his local HR co-worker didn’t care too much for the freedom that has to go with creative research.

”These people NEVER keep regular hours,” she complained. “They don’t complete their performance appraisal paperwork. They are out of fucking control (her angry words – why are HR woman permanently angry?). Your job is to make that stop...” she told Peter.

Qualifications for successful research team management such a Nobel Prize cut no ice with Peter’s HR colleague.

”They must learn to respect Process,” she maintained.

Peter quit. And thus Human Dynamics was born, at just about the same time as Pete’s first son was.

”That’s the trouble with HR,” Peter said. “Nothing’s changed. They’ve got no….no….what’s the “m” word?”

The Belgian beer was taking effect.

”Empathy?” I volunteered.

”Thassit. No empathy. HR simply isn’t engaged with the actual workforce any more. They’re all process jockeys. Have been for years….”

It was then that we both realised what the problem with “Punk Rock HR” as a book title was.

The ”Punk Rock” bit is actually just fine.

It’s the “Human Resources” concept that’s clapped out, fucked up and irrelevant.

Good managers simply don’t need “HR” to interfere with day-to-day management issues any more.

I showed my own plant manager Pete’s first draft. This is a man who has no time for ‘management books’ of any description, and who gleefully binned the corporate copy of the hated “Who Moved The Cheese” after he heard me vent my spleen about it.

He loved it. I think decent managers everywhere will. And you certainly won’t get better value for money from any other management guide

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to “Punk Rock People Management”.

Does What It Says On The Cover. Coming soon to an Internet near you…

Telling It Like It Isn't...

2011-06-22T20:28:00.001+01:00

The new, improved, All-Brown PharmaGossip draws our attention to the Stalinesque practices of major pharmaceutical companies who are rewriting their Wikipedia entries to make them more “acceptable” to corporate sensibilities.

Large pharmaceutical companies operate corporate management philosophies that are really quite Orwellian in outlook. They are always quick to airbrush ousted directors from corporate history in the aftermath of its frequent “purges”, and are constantly using the threat of the Gulag of unemployment as a means to keep the masses downtrodden. Recidivists are often referred to company psychiatrists on the logical basis that anyone who is unhappy with company practices must clearly be mad. “Five-year plans” and corporate conquests (in the form of mergers, takeovers and licensing agreements) are announced by the glorious leadership every few months and are just as frequently changed, with no thought of the stability or continuity of ongoing work programmes.

In the world of corporate pharmaceutical leadership, the truth is simply whatever they wish to tell us, and if a lie is repeated often enough, it can become the truth.

Indeed, Phoni CEO Jock McGreed has recently instructed Phoni’s IT and corporate security divisions to closely monitor all on-line reference sources to Phoni Pharmaceutical Inc. and make sure that they stay “on message” with respect to Phoni’s corporate image…

Dear Ian:

We have reviewed the Wikipedia entry for Phoni Pharmaceuticals Inc. and have deleted the extraneous and unhelpful text as you have instructed. Please review the deletions and let us know if you and the Board are happy with the final proposed entry…

Phoni Pharmaceuticals Incorporated is currently the world’s largest imaginary pharmaceutical company, with a long history ~~of poor public relations and corporate dishonesty~~, stretching back to its foundation in 1910.

Phoni’s first branded product was launched in that year. Huckster’s Patented Comet Pills were ~~supposedly~~ able to offer protection against the ~~wildly exaggerated~~ ill effects that were anticipated to occur from the predicted global encounter with Halley’s Comet, and as a result, the medicine was widely taken by ~~the gullible amongst~~ the US population at the time.

Ever since then, Phoni has established a wide range of pharmaceutical products, many of which offer ~~dubious~~ benefits for a variety of ~~totally specious~~ conditions that have ~~largely been created or exaggerated by their own corporate marketing division to give the illusion of having~~ life-threatening capabilities.

Its current largest selling product, the ~~controversial~~ painkiller and antipsychotic medicine Saloadatat, has been ~~the subject of much regulatory and public scrutiny over its claims to be~~ accredited as one of the safest and most effective drugs of its class on the market. In particular, its prescription to young children has been responsible for a repeated outcry due to its additive and mood-altering side effects, with many cases of suicides amongst teenagers being attributed to its use. A storm of criticism has surrounded Phoni’s practice of paying lavish fees and expenses to key researchers and institutions. Although such payments have been robustly defended, it is claimed by many that they cast doubts over Phoni’s claims that the use of Saloadatat in young children is recommended by leading independent psychiatric experts as one of the few antipsychotics that is perfectly safe for use in such cases.

Other well-known Phoni products include:

Priapic, a treatment for erectile dysfunction, which has been ~~largely overshadowed by more~~ efficacious ~~competitors,~~

Lucrative, currently the largest-selling medicine for high cholesterol, ~~but which is suffering because of competition from cheaper generics and is soon to come off patent,~~

Protubera, a novel inhaled form of insulin for diabetics, which was predicted to have sales of over $2 billion ~~by 2010, but got pulled from market after second quarter 2007 sales of just $4 million~~.

Phoni’s CEO and Chief Executive Officer, Jock McGreed, is on record as saying that his principal objective as CEO is to “do as much as I can to enhance ~~my own personal wealth and that of our directors and major shareholders, irrespective of~~ any company commitment to human healthcare activities within the company. This will be achieved through ~~vicious and short-sighted cost-cutting and elimination of~~ our existing excellent staff and facilities in the US and Europe, whilst simultaneously encouraging ~~the transfer of new and existing business to cheaper and less regulated~~ developments in the Far East and Asia.”

“It is my belief that this approach will ~~completely undermine the morale of our research, development and marketing staff, and has effectively destroyed any chance to~~ develop a new wave of blockbusting new drugs that will be capable of sustaining the company’s premier position amongst its industry peers. However, I still remain confident of being able to ~~bribe our investors into keeping my job for another five years until such time as I can then collect a huge severance package and loot the pension fund on my way out. I’m sure I will be able to~~ emulate the remarkable track record of success as enjoyed by my predecessors in this respect, given the ~~depth of apathy and indifference that I and my fellow Directors have towards the~~ excellence of our facilities, our processes and the hardworking dedication of our staff.”

Given the ~~recent and dramatic decline in~~ Phoni Pharmaceutical’s fortunes of late and its ~~poor~~ quality of leadership, many financial experts are saying that it seems ~~unlikely~~ that Phoni will remain in the top ten of industry rankings for much longer.

If in agreement, we will amend the current Wikipedia entry immediately.

Best wishes:

Charlotte Grovelling
Vice President
Phoni IT

The End Is Nigh...

2011-06-21T20:07:00.002+01:00

It really does seem like the end of the line for Gormenghast-On-Sea, aka Pfizer Sandwich.

A lament recently went up in the local press, who published the view of an anonymous "senior scientist" (sounds high-falutin' but that's a relatively junior grade - maybe yet another symptom of the grandiosity of the place) who claimed that Pfizer was doing "too little, too late" to keep the workforce and its skills at Sandwich.

Now I have a couple of contacts with guys who deal with local trade associations and Thanet District Council, who have been trying to get into dialogue with Pfizer into possible uses of the site and its workforce.

And the overriding impression from these sources is that Pfizer simply isn't interested. They aren't talking and they don't want to talk. Whatever the deal is, it seems to have been done.

In fairness, that deal could be one that will allow the seamless transfer of staff and assets to a new owner, thus preserving the livelihoods of at least some of the staff and in turn, the well-being of the local community.

Or it could really be that all of the talk of possible CROs deals was a cynical smokescreen that allowed Pfizer to put in the necessary arrangements to cut and run, whilst avoiding a stampede of staff who were needed for the short-term operation of the site prior to final "light outs doors shut" time.

I'm quite taken with the "Gormanghast" comparison. Mervyn Peake's epic fantasy told of the doings of a strange, declining and completely isolated community, governed by a ruling class that was completely cut off from reality and obsessed with its historic rituals, all set against the background of a vast, decaying city living off of its former glories. The analogy with Pfizer Sandwich could not be more exact. It might even be my Christmas theme this year...

I don't know whether it was arrogance or optimism that led to an apparent assumption that businesses would fall over themselves to occupy such grandiose and effectively useless facilities.

AZ's facilities at Loughborough remain unoccupied. Ditto GSK Harlow. The operating costs of Pfizer's 3.5 million square feet of hi-tech low productivity palaces far exceed those behemoths. Which is precisely the amount of space CRO's simply don't need, it seems.

I think we'll all find out the fate of the last of the UK's pharmaceutical R&D dinosaurs soon.

And I fear the worst.

...And Finally This Week...

2011-06-17T17:38:00.070+01:00

Apparently, it seems, some people think they are my friends on the basis of what I write, even given that I choose to remain anonymous. Some even seem to get a bit upset when I say that I don't share this definition of being a "friend".

If I did, I would have hundreds of new friends, such as Ms. Kipkalya of Nigeria. She keeps writing to me and promising to be a very special friend indeed, if only I would send her my bank details...

I am old-fashioned enough to define a "friend" as someone I can actually meet face to face, even if only occasionally, and still feel that we are mutually enjoying each others's company and trust.

The idea of having "friends" who think they know you solely because of what you write is a trifle creepy. Shit, even I don't think too much of the crap written here...

You'd be disappointed if you met me for real - honestly...

Take The Fiddy Test...

2011-06-15T20:36:00.000+01:00

Calling all parents of young children.

Are you doing your bit to support the pharmaceutical industry in its times of need?

Get your kids to take Fiddy's simple test and then take them round to your pharma-sponsored GP today!!!

Dave and Andrew need your support.

Remember, their companies can't make huge profits from chemically coshing your children unless you believe everything your doctors tell you...

Trust your GP. He will have been educated by the finest marketing materials pharmaceutical industry money can buy...

Fiddy's sense of humour has a grim edge. I challenge anyone to watch his Sarah Carlin video and then try and laugh at the above.

Of all of the wrongs committed by the pharmaceutical industry for greed and profit, surely history will recall the bent science, the high-pressure and often illegal marketing and the forcible stealth drugging of our children with mind- and personality-destroying drugs as the greatest evils of all...

Resistance is Futile...

2011-06-15T19:36:00.001+01:00

Sanofivac changes Gonzyme reporting

French drug maker Sanofivac yesterday told employees of Gonzyme Corp., the Cambridge company Sanofivac acquired in April, that they will have a new reporting structure within the parent company.

Sanofivac chief executive Christopher A. Viehbacher said earlier this year that Gonzyme will change its name to “Vichy Gonzyme” and remain a standalone biotechnology unit under the dominion of the Sanofivac dictatorship.

In an employee bulletin broadcast from a hollowed-out volcano in Paris, France, yesterday, Viehbacher said that the Gonzyme unit:

“…will be ground into the dust under my pitiless boot. All of Gonzyme’s current oncology, biosurgery, and renal operations will be made subservient to the Sanofi businesses…”

“Former Gonzyme employees will be shown no mercy. All will be eliminated, as an example to those who dare to resist the might of Sanofivac. Resistance is useless. THE WORLD WILL SOON BE MINE!!! BWU HA HA HA!!!...”

Sanofivac said Viehbacher will continue as acting Gonzyme commander in chief and exalted dictator for life until September, when a new puppet management team, slavishly and unquestioningly loyal to Sanofivac, will be installed.

Completely unrelated tales reach us from the real world...

Hat-tip FierceBiotech.

Antisocial Contract...

2011-06-15T19:11:00.000+01:00

Pharmaceutical companies 'taking out a contract' on society

Richard Barking-Madd, who last week left the Apologists for the British Pharmaceutical Industry after six years at the helm, told The Daily Loonygraph that the industry was "in the midst of profound carnage".

“We're moving progressively from a model where most of the large companies did most of their research and development internally, to a situation where companies are not doing any original research at all and are hoping against all logic that they can just buy their ideas in,” he said.

“Large companies are therefore becoming increasingly desperate to work closely with universities, research charities and small and medium-sized enterprises in the Far East, despite a poor track record of productivity from these areas.”

“The flaws in this partnership approach have been illustrated by GSK’s multi-million pound debacles with Resveratrol and Almorexant.”

“As drug makers look to drive better short-term dividends for their corporate shareholders and shore up their share prices, they have slashed costs by shutting down in-house discovery and, in some cases, also brought bureaucratic paralysis to universities and other publically- or charity-funded research organisations.”

Dr Barking-Madd said this was likely to continue, adding: “Mergers solve some problems, but not others. For example, the stock market likes mergers and acquisitions and the cost-cutting lay-offs they usually involve. What mergers don’t ever do is get rid of the vast number of useless R&D middle managers who have been screwing up the development process for the past 10 years.”

“I think the industry in the process of taking out a contract on society,” he said.

“In effect, what pharmaceutical companies, their senior executives and investors are saying to society is “fuck you, peasants, we’re just going to loot the industry for every penny we can get, and we don’t give a toss if you all die of some horrible new plague because we’ve fucked up or shut down every single avenue for research into medicines for new diseases, all for our own personal wealth and power,” he added.

“I’m bloody glad I’m retiring before this all becomes apparent,” Dr. Barking-Madd concluded.

In the real world, the UK’s premier broadsheet for puffing up the pharmaceutical industry completely misses the point…

Do Not Feed The Animals...

2011-06-14T23:03:00.001+01:00

Pfizer site in Sandwich sold to Howlett’s as 'Jurassic Park'

Pfizer's Kent base has been sold to the Aspinall Foundation, owner of the nearby Howletts wild animal park, after the pharmaceutical company announced in February that the site which employs 2,400 people would close.

The site, which has buildings housing laboratories and production facilities, has been renamed "Jurassic Park".

John Westworld, from Pfizer, said the name reflected the company's decision to abandon outdated ideas of in-house pharmaceutical research in favour of letting public funded organisations or small start-ups do its research instead.

”We know that at best only about 1 in 5 new products actually come from this route, but we don’t care any more,” he said.

“We’ve basically given up trying to develop any new medicines and we just want to cash in our assets while we can.”

The sales brochure also states some of the land in Sandwich could be used for leisure, retail or housing.

“This is completely in line with our policy of selling off anything and everything we can to make massive short-term profits for our executives and investors,” Westworld said.

'Research hopeless'

Local MP Cynthia Knee-Trembler said: "What we really want is a face-saving use for the site now that all of the CROs have been scared away by the massive cost of the site overheads. The Howletts bid will mean I won’t look completely useless and ineffectual after all…”

Mr Westworld, a senior Pfizer Sandwich site director, said: "The original suggestion of 'Discovery Park' for a name was abandoned after we realised that we hadn’t actually discovered anything there for the last 15 years”.

"We anticipate that the alternative ‘Jurassic Park’ campaign will help attract visitors to the site, and secure its future,"

An Aspinall Foundation spokesman said that there were no immediate plans to change the nature of the site.

”We think people will be interested to see how pharmaceutical R&D was done back in Age of the Dinosaurs, when money was no object and the only economies were with thinking” he said.

”Massive white elephant R&D facilities provide habitats for the very specialised creatures that pharmaceutical scientists have become. The wholesale loss of their environment means that these delicate organisms are virtually extinct in the UK.”

”This sad loss of Pfizer R&D species means far fewer Powerpoint presentations and a great reduction in impenetrable jargon, mindless acronyms and middle-management bullshit. A whole language is being lost, along with the unique behaviour patterns of these strange and exotic organisms.”

”We hope visitors to the site will enjoy seeing these few remaining UK R&D researchers in their vast natural habitats,” the Howletts spokesman said.

Completely unrelated takes from the real world can be found here...

...And Finally This Week...

2011-06-10T19:36:00.000+01:00

My management insider at Pfizer Sandwich is being rather tight-lipped about the due diligence processes currently going on down there...

Let's hope there's something in the air.

Have a great weekend, folks...

Giles...

An Apology...

2011-06-10T19:21:00.000+01:00

Well Where Are They, Then?

On Tuesday, March 08, 2011, Planet Thanet ran a headline stating that “Businesses rush to snap up Pfizer site as drug firm admits to talks” and a subsequent article stating that “Pfizer has said it is in talks with more than 10 companies about taking over its Sandwich site.”

We now wish to unreservedly apologise for printing such drivel.

We published information we received from Pfizer’s senior site management, and failed to undertake the basic fact-checking exercise any decent journalist should have applied. Instead, we just uncritically printed whatever the Pfizer PR people gave us.

We accept that we have been made to look like idiots.

Now, in common with the 4,000-odd people employed at Pfizer’s Sandwich site, we wish to ask the question, “if businesses are rushing to “snap up” the Pfizer site, well where the bloody hell are they, then?”

We look forward being able to give you some real news soon, rather than just parroting some Pfizer PR bullshit, snatching at straws or making stuff up.

Yours truly,

The Editor
Planet Thanet

In the real world, it’s all gone quiet. I see no CROS with blank chequebooks coming to take on the Zeppelin hangars that are Pfizer R&D…

Counting Sheep...

2011-06-10T18:56:00.000+01:00

GSK and Actelion discontinue clinical development of almorexant

GlaxoSmithKline and Actelion Ltd have announced that clinical development of the Phase III investigational dual orexin receptor antagonist, almorexant, has been discontinued. This decision follows a review of data from additional clinical studies, which were conducted to further establish the clinical profile of almorexant, including the tolerability profile.

Instead, GSK and Actelion instead are pleased to announce that a video of GSK’s Head of R&D Moncef Saloui outlining GSK’s research strategy has proved highly effective as a treatment for insomnia.

In Phase Three trials, not one subject was able to stay awake whilst listening to Moncef’s droning voice and his use of incomprehensible managerial jargon.

The video outlines Moncef’s objective to double R&D productivity…getting drowsy…to deliver medicines that can be reimbursed by payors as well as registered by regulator...too tired to work out what that means... focus on the best science…eyelids getting heavy….re-personalise R&D…so boring…diversify through externalisation…yawn…focus on return on investment…zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…

In the real world, it’s funny to note how GSK’s $635 million screw-up didn’t quite make it into Moncef’s dreary monologue.

Perhaps that’s why he can’t look his audience in the eye…

Stuffed...

2011-06-09T18:11:00.000+01:00

Cluck! Pfizer Withdraws Poultry Plumping Product

Pfizer is voluntarily suspending US sales of its Roxarsone product, which has been used as a chicken-feed additive by poultry farmers for nearly 70 years, after a recent FDA study of 100 broiler chickens found elevated levels of Viagra in chickens that were given the med compared with untreated chickens.

”I knew there was a problem with the product as soon as I started using it,” said one poultry farmer.

“After just a few hours, my cock grew to enormous proportions. At first I was pleased to have a really large cock, but then it just got in the way. Its appetite was insatiable and it became aggressive. After a while, colleagues started pointing and laughing at it.”

“You may think that having a big cock is a good thing but believe me, it’s spoiled my work and my life…”

And so now, Pfizer’s Alpharma unit has agreed to suspend sales in 30 days. “We are pleased to announce that the company is cooperating with us to protect the public health,” sniggered FDA deputy food commish Mike Taylor.

“It appears there were manufacturing and packaging mix-ups at the company’s Chinese subsidiary, and the company has now withdrawn the product.”

“After all, the last thing anyone wants out there is a bunch of guys with giant cocks, crowing all the time and frightening women…”

Sorry. I know. An obvious gag but I just couldn’t help myself. Real world story here…

Return Of The Daleks...

2011-06-08T22:28:00.000+01:00

I continue to maintain that Pharmaceutical HR departments are staffed by people who are, at best, useless jobsworths, through a whole spectrum of social misfits up to (and occasionally beyond) the terminally sociopathic.

But just when I start to mellow a little, a story like this one comes along...

........................................................................................

Er, Hello? Is that Human Resources?

YES. YOU ARE SPEAKING. TO THE DALEKS. WHAT IS. YOUR PROBLEM?

Well, I'm just ringing to let you know that I can't come to work. My ex-husband has threatened to kill me. He's been arrested, but let out on bail. The police have told me to go into hiding. He knows where I work. He'll stake out my office. I'm scared he'll kill me...

YOU MUST REPORT. FOR DUTY.

But I'm scared. He's crazy. He might kill me. Really...

YOU MUST REPORT. FOR DUTY.

But I can't. I'm scared. The police have told me...

YOU MUST REPORT. FOR DUTY. OR YOU WILL BE. TERMINATED! TERMINATED! TERMINATED!

Look, state law says I'm entitled to...

WE DO NOT CARE. ABOUT STATE LAW. COMPANY LAW TAKES PRECEDENT. YOU MUST REPORT. FOR DUTY. OR YOU WILL BE. TERMINATED! TERMINATED! TERMINATED!

Please. I beg you...

THERE CAN BE NO EXCEPTIONS. WE ARE THE DALEKS. WE HAVE NO PITY. YOU MUST REPORT. FOR DUTY. OR YOU WILL BE. TERMINATED! TERMINATED! TERMINATED!

.....................................................................................

If you do work in Pharmaceutical HR and are not socially defective, then please be assured that I am writing about someone else.

But what are the chances of that?

The Apostasy of Saint Witty...

2011-06-08T21:19:00.001+01:00

1. ‘Twas in the summer of the year of Our Lord Two Thousand and Nine, that Saint Witty did speak unto the massed ranks of stock market analysts, corporate investment banks and other money-changers in the Great Temple of Mammon.

2. And yea did he promise them great riches, for Saint Witty was a disciple of Saint Garnier the Unrepentant.

3. “For verily shall we be cutting vaccine prices to the Third World”, said Saint Witty.

4. And greatly displeased were the money-changers, who waxed lachrymose about potential loss of earnings and foolish philanthropic gestures.

5. But Saint Witty laughed at the money-changers, saying, “Brothers, canst thou not see that cutting prices for Third World medicines is not good philanthropy, but good business?”

6. “For remember the teachings of Saint Garnier, that say that it is better to take from a poor man all that he can afford, rather than nothing because he cannot. Lower prices mean we can make buckets more money from the poor by increasing sales volumes.”

7. And thus the money-changers were appeased, and lo didst Saint Witty gain a 76% increase in Executive Compensation.

8. But wroth was GAVI and the Mighty Billanmelissa of the Foundation of the Gates, whose charitable works do so much to alleviate the tax burden of the world’s richest man.

9. And lo didst Saint Witty tremble before Billanmelissa’s demands that he and his peers must do more to end the suffering of the poor and needy, and must end their greedy profiteering, yea even from Africa’s sickest little children.

10. For Saint Witty knew a PR disaster when he saw one.

11. Thus did Saint Witty speak with his disciples and at great length to his trusted Non-Executive Director, Brother James of Murdoch, Son of the Mighty Rupert, Dark Lord of News International.

12. And lo, did the World’s media suddenly acclaim Saint Witty as a great philanthropist, and saviour of the Third World’s sick and needy, for his selfless act in reducing vaccine prices for the very poorest people on earth.

13. Indeed, so great was Saint Witty’s new-found fervour for good deeds that he spake thus, saying that lowering of vaccine prices was “"not a gimmick or one-off philanthropic gesture, but part of a concerted strategy to change our business model".

14. Waxed Saint Witty: "I believe industry, including the pharmaceutical sector, sometimes hasn't helped itself by operating as if we were detached from society. I hope this will enable millions of children to receive this important vaccine, saving countless lives in the future.”

15. "Specifically, we are aligning our commercial success with doing what we can to tackle the healthcare needs of people in all countries, including the poorest.”

16. And lo did the World’s media fall before the feet of Saint Witty, and worship him, and garland him with flowers of great fragrance.

17. Even thus did Andrew Mitchell, the International Development Secretary, bask in the radiance of the light from the fundament of Saint Witty, saying: "I hope that the entire industry will follow the path down which Andrew Witty and GSK is blazing a trail.”

18. And so it was that Brother James of Murdoch saw to it that Merck, and Sanofi, and Crucell, and yea even Johnson and Johnson, and indeed a whole multitude of other companies, did not get to steal Saint Witty’s headlines, even though they too had cut prices, yea even by ten-fold.

19. And never again was the marketing of Avandia or Seroxat ever mentioned. Or toxic vaccines.

20. Indeed, so great became Saint Witty’s passion for the well being of people of the Third World, that he didst close all of his factories and laboratories in the UK, and in Europe, and yea even in the US, and move all of those jobs to the Third World.

21. And thus did the Third World become healthy and wealthy, whilst the UK fell into poverty and plague.

22. Until once more did Saint Witty speak unto the World’s Media, saying unto them: “Wash, Rinse, Repeat…”

23. And the money changers said “It is Good”…

Once more it seems that the UK’s favourite pharma CEO and his company are shining examples of corporate compassion and responsibility.

But if you, like me, need an occasional counterbalance to the uncritical tributes in the mainstream media, then why not surf on over to here…?

Dying To Quit...

2011-06-07T21:11:00.000+01:00

Did Pfizer Report Chantix Sale Reps Suicides Correctly?

Hundreds of reports of suicides, psychotic reactions and other serious problems tied to the marketing of popular stop-smoking drug Chantix have turned up in a new analysis by the non-profit Institute for Safe Marketing Practices.

“We’ve had a major breakdown in marketing surveillance,” said Thomas Tallis (who bares no man any malice/except an organist called Ken/who plays his music rather badly now and then), the ISMP senior scientist who analysed the data.

There are serious problems for those who have to market the drug in the face of all of bad publicity it has had — including reports of completed suicides, suicide attempts, aggression and hostility and depression — with some dating back to 2006, the year Chantix, or varenicline, was approved.

They echo previous claims that the drug can induce extreme reactions in people trying sell the drug, including vivid nightmares, crippling depression and sudden, violent outbursts.

“It’s really chilling,” said Tallis, who analyzed 26 Chantix sales teams in a paper published in the September 2010 issue of the Journal of Pharmacotherapy. "This seems to unleash something in sales reps and their managers. It can be violence to anything around."

Tallis's case studies describe "inexplicable and unprovoked" reactions in Chantix sales staff with no previous history of violence or mental illness, including:

A 24-year-old District marketing manager who started beating her sub-ordinates when sales of Chantix dropped and who later attempted suicide;
A 42-year-old Pfizer manager who punched a stranger at a bowling alley when he said that Chantix caused suicides
A 47-year-old sales rep who died after she came out of doctor’s surgery, yelled at the doctor for not writing more prescriptions, and then shot herself.

Pfizer officials said they were submitting reports as required and that when the FDA asked them to change, they did so immediately.

“There's no proof that Chantix causes suicide or other serious side effects,” a Pfizer spokesman said. “None at all. Everything is being exaggerated by a hostile, ignorant media. BASTARDS!! HATE!! HATE!!”

“Chantix is a great product. I take it every day, and I don’t even smoke. It’s done me no harm at all STOP RINGING THOSE BELLS STOP RINGING THOSE BELLS and I can’t see why anyone would even want to denigrate such a wonderful drug. That makes me angry. So ANGRY!! D’HEAR ME, PUNK?!! I WANNA KILL!! KILL THEM ALL!!!! ARGGGGHHHH!!!”

Tallis, who has served as an expert witness in court regarding Chantix, said it's the riskiest drug for pharmaceutical sales reps.

Pfizer officials said they are committed to reduce the number of reported cases of stress amongst its Chantix sales reps, by laying off large numbers of them.

Pfizer officials, however, said that the firm was following the FDA's rules and changed their reporting process once the agency asked for clarification.

“All post-marketing reports of adverse events are reviewed by Pfizer and reported to regulators, including FDA, in accordance with regulatory guidelines,” the company said in a statement. “Pfizer takes the mental health of its sales staff very seriously.”

Suicide is an 'expected' event?

The problem appears to have been caused in part by federal Food and Drug Administration rules that don’t require firms to submit new reports of death or serious harm amongst pharmaceutical sales staff charged with the task of selling medicines that everyone knows may have serious side effects.

“It’s very clear the suicide risk of this drug was higher than we knew when we first started selling it,” one rep said.

“Everyone is now suspicious about Chantix, yet our sales quotas are being pushed higher and higher and there are fewer and fewer of us. It’s really stressful being asked to push ever-increasing volume of something everyone knows might not be safe.”

“Yet if we miss quota, our district managers get aggressive and start shouting and threatening us, and telling us to fall on our swords and commit Hari Kari. Anybody would think they’d been taking Chantix...”

Completely unrelated tales reach us from the real world, courtesy of Pharmalot...

Going Straight...

2011-06-06T22:37:00.000+01:00

Pfizer today denied rumours that they had been indicted in Denmark for the smuggling and subsequent illegal marketing of Marmite.

"Just because we're the biggest corporate criminals in the world when it comes to illegal marketing, it doesn't mean we're guilty of everything," said one of Pfizer's Marmite Marlins.

"We fully respect the Danish govermnent's decision to ban Marmite. This is one load of brown stuff that for once, Pfizer isn't up to its neck in..."

Shiver me Timbers, me hearties! Pirates on the port bow! Denmark's bizarre prohibition of a British epicurian institution gives an opportunity for all sorts of illegal marketing activities. Already I hear tales of dozens of underground Marmite dens ("Marmeasys") springing up across Scandinavia.

Perhaps the Danes are working up to a ban on "Gentlemen's Relish?"

Up In Smoke...

2011-06-06T21:51:00.002+01:00

GW Pharmaceuticals has signed up Swiss drug group Novartis to sell Sativex, its cannabis-based multiple sclerosis drug, whereby Novartis will pay an initial $5m (£3m) to sell Sativex in Australia, New Zealand, Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

GW is also potentially in line for $28.75m of milestone payments as well as royalties on sales.

Justin Gover, GW's managing director, said: "We are delighted to have entered into this agreement with Novartis. As one of the world's leading pharmaceutical companies with a strategic focus in both MS and oncology, Novartis represents an excellent commercial partner for Sativex in these important and growing international markets."

Seven years ago, the early development of Sativex was dealt a serious blow after GlaxoSmithKline, then the world's second-largest drugs company, abandoned talks on a possible deal.

“Thank God that they did, given their track record of disaster since then,” a GW spokesman remarked. “A deal with GSK would probably have been the kiss of death for GW”.

GSK gave a muted response when asked for their reaction to the deal given their past involvement with GK.

“Whilst we wish GW every success in their venture, we still believe that Sativex is not a good fit for GSK,” a spokesman for GSK said.

“Sativex may be derived from cannabis, but our senior executives prefer a much bigger rush than that drug can provide. They are addicted to serious blow – such as blowing hundreds of millions of dollars on useless drugs.”

“Avandia. Resveratrol. Almorexant. All have been multi-million dollar disasters. Our execs get a real buzz when they blow money like that. Sativex is way too good a drug for it to satisfy our senior leadership’s addiction to billion dollar failures...”

What other possible explanation can there be for GSK’s recent R&D deals?

...And Finally This Week...

2011-05-27T21:18:00.001+01:00

This one's for my former colleague and inveterate cat person Laurie, whose increasingly bizarre "too much personal stuff" posting topics show that HR juggernauting really is not good for you...

Sorry about the lack of output this week - must try harder...

Have a great UK Bank Holiday weekend...

Best wishes:

Giles...

Lay-offs 101 - How Not To Do It...

2011-05-25T21:57:00.000+01:00

A soon-to-be-downsized Pfizer Cardiovascular Medicine researcher writes...

"About 50% of the folks in CVMED research in Groton were offered jobs at the new location in Cambridge MA. Those who didn't accept the role were told they would be leaving the company on 1 June.... until yesterday when they told that they would have to stay for an indefinite period (yep that's about a week before they were due to leave). The vicious rumour is that only 5 people have accepted the offer to move with the company, so they found themselves in a huge hole i.e. nobody to train those bright new PhD's in Mass.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, quite a few people were upset given they had made plans and, apparently, somebody called up Ian Read to complain. This seemed to have a rather negative impact with management apparently being very angry at being grassed up, and so they are now holding everybody until the very last wave in Sept (Can't we hear the cries of "That will show the buggers").

Even though the labs have all been shut down, and most of the chemical type things sent to the trash, they are opening them up again and designing new experiments for the next three months (just to keep the proles busy).

I wasn't sure they could sink lower...but they just did..."

Ah, this must be the "Respect For People" thing I keep hearing about...