• Tue news: Where do Harris and Trump stand on health policy? Medtronic renal denervation coverage. Canada less likely to have drug shortages? Wall Street wants CVS execution plan. Nektar manufacturing facility sale. See more on our front page

Merck is dead

Quote












Anonymous said:
You must be new. Unfortunately, the Merck that once was is no longer recognizable. When Singulair goes off patent, the company will have significant trouble.
Click to expand...

you can say that again. and it's as true for Merck as for the rest of the industry, generic manufacturers excepted. Good luck with innovation, MRL, I'd really love to see you delivering.
 




Anonymous said:
you people are dumb shits, Merck is a 112B dollar company. It ain't goin no where. Your job may be going but it isn't. I work for Merck and love my job, I work hard, help pateients, get paid for it and help the company. I am no pill pusher, I work with the docs to treat patients and they love me for it. I am a resource, you are not it sounds like. When lipitor goes off, we will be #1. for what ever that is worth. I feel your pain, this company is way too big and steps all over its self trying to help the patient and the docs. Treat it like its your own company in your territory and forget about all the other stuff happening around you that they think is important. You get paid once a year so relax and do your job, they couldn't fire your for the numbers because they don't even know what they are. They don't fire on numbers anyway, look at all the people you know that got let go in the past and tell me it was on numbers. Ride this wave while you can, you could be working 9 to 5. We are not. And its a great life.
Click to expand...

Think about the Kodak of 40 years ago. The Merck of today isn't even close to 1970's Kodak relative size or value. Kodak's share price has declined 99% since then. Of course, Merck will be taken out before that happens, but you get my drift. Both became hollow shells of formerly great innovation giants. Kodak was and Merck is now, unable to attract the talent (and would be unable to direct them anyway if they could) required to turn it around. Kodak held its rank and postured as a great company for at least 15 years after this peak but the writing was on the wall during that whole period - a period when there was no commercial China and Wall Street was not so cut-throat. Pharmas only have come to their exalted valuation in the last 25 years and only part of the reason for it is innovation. The other is their extortionate pricing and aggressive lobbying in the US, something that cannot go on forever. It turns out that even bribing congressmen is not sustainable once you lose your patent protection. Selling modern medicine worldwide to poor suckers that earn $1/day is not the business model that got Merck to peak above $90/share nor is it a business model that it can survive with. Maybe a firm that can truly cut costs could survive there - someone like Cipla - but not Merck. Today Merck is posturing only - because it has lost the real things that made it great - believe me. Inside information that most of us live every day. Too big to fail?
 




Anonymous said:
you people are dumb shits, Merck is a 112B dollar company. It ain't going no where. Your job may be going but it isn't. I work for Merck and love my job, I work hard, help patients, get paid for it and help the company. I am no pill pusher, I work with the docs to treat patients and they love me for it. I am a resource, you are not it sounds like. When Lipitor goes off, we will be #1. for what ever that is worth. I feel your pain, this company is way too big and steps all over its self trying to help the patient and the docs. Treat it like its your own company in your territory and forget about all the other stuff happening around you that they think is important. You get paid once a year so relax and do your job, they couldn't fire your for the numbers because they don't even know what they are. They don't fire on numbers anyway, look at all the people you know that got let go in the past and tell me it was on numbers. Ride this wave while you can, you could be working 9 to 5. We are not. And its a great life.
Click to expand...

You know just enough about the industry to be "dangerous". Waiting for Lipitor to go off patent so Merck can ascend to the #1 throne is not the way to do business nor to live a life. Merck has been squeezing more out of Zocor with Vytorin. But eventually that will be history too. Pfizer people are busily looking for replacement(s) for Lipitor too. It did not work in the past by waiting for Feldene (a Pfizer's anti-inflammatory) to go off patent. Lastly, do we have a cholesterol drug with full patent protection waiting to replace the throne of Lipitor?
 




Anonymous said:
You know just enough about the industry to be "dangerous". Waiting for Lipitor to go off patent so Merck can ascend to the #1 throne is not the way to do business nor to live a life. Merck has been squeezing more out of Zocor with Vytorin. But eventually that will be history too. Pfizer people are busily looking for replacement(s) for Lipitor too. It did not work in the past by waiting for Feldene (a Pfizer's anti-inflammatory) to go off patent. Lastly, do we have a cholesterol drug with full patent protection waiting to replace the throne of Lipitor?
Click to expand...

Only hopefully, and then, if successful, only in 4-5 years time. How long will the game of mixing relatively ineffective, petented drugs, with off-patent effective drugs be able to bring in money. Since today most healthcare spending is invisible, we do not pay much attention to the market drivers. Howwever, if the choice were 20-cent simvastatin or nothing rather than today's choice of 20-cent simvastatin or 3-dollar Vytorin (for the same apparent price), how unhealthy would the patient really become on simvastatin. Does anyone think that balancing the budget will not involve creating such choices in order to save $2.80?
 








Anonymous said:
And will this #1 selling DPP4 inhibitor replace the $5 billion loss in revenue when Singulair goes off-patent, off wise one?.....don't think so. Merck's days of glory are over.
Click to expand...

It will come close to replacing the actual lost revenue. But is staying level with nothing in the future execpt cutting cost what makes for an interesting future?.Sometime in the future, the Zetia/Vytorin game will be exposed and that will be a big ouch, especially with so many generic choices for statins. If the new cholesterol drug does not pan out, there is a lot of serious pain in 5 years' time. Combo therapies are not going to carry the same value as new breakthrough therapies.
 




Similarly when a patient can get metformin free at a local chain or $4 co-pay at others, he is willing to endure the extra side effects versus paying for Januvia. $8 for both metformin and SFU for a month. Think about that.
 




Anonymous said:
It will come close to replacing the actual lost revenue. But is staying level with nothing in the future execpt cutting cost what makes for an interesting future?.Sometime in the future, the Zetia/Vytorin game will be exposed and that will be a big ouch, especially with so many generic choices for statins. If the new cholesterol drug does not pan out, there is a lot of serious pain in 5 years' time. Combo therapies are not going to carry the same value as new breakthrough therapies.
Click to expand...

Now, THIS is an individual who understands the BOTTOM LINE (although I think, in the end of the day when it's too late to help Merck, Zetia WILL prove to have been an effective and useful medication) ....
 




Anonymous said:
Similarly when a patient can get metformin free at a local chain or $4 co-pay at others, he is willing to endure the extra side effects versus paying for Januvia. $8 for both metformin and SFU for a month. Think about that.
Click to expand...

This is the same story with any generic competitor. Bad economy means people have no money. All the pharmas are giving big discount coupons.
 




The economy has been tanked for so long that people (and more importantly insurance companies) will have established new buying patterns and expectations that might make it impossible for big pharma to ever recover their pricing power. Without demonstrating real benefits, the race might go more often to the cheaper. And if they cannot tolerate that discounting in the US and EU, how will the third world fill Whitehouse Station's coffers? By the time the bribes are paid, nothing will remain for the bottom line.
 




Anonymous said:
This is the same story with any generic competitor. Bad economy means people have no money. All the pharmas are giving big discount coupons.
Click to expand...

No matter how easy it is to use a coupon, you still cannot beat the price of 90 days of generic Vasetretic or Prinzide versus Hyzaar. Ten bucks. As a Merck employee who used to promote all three, it is hard to say Hyzaar is that much better. It is not only the economy. People are getting more informed too.
 




Anonymous said:
The economy has been tanked for so long that people (and more importantly insurance companies) will have established new buying patterns and expectations that might make it impossible for big pharma to ever recover their pricing power. Without demonstrating real benefits, the race might go more often to the cheaper. And if they cannot tolerate that discounting in the US and EU, how will the third world fill Whitehouse Station's coffers? By the time the bribes are paid, nothing will remain for the bottom line.
Click to expand...

Obama care will mean generics and care cuts. Have you seen the cost of a policy lately?
 




Anonymous said:
There are a lot of reps with very little tenure that speak like they know Merck. I used to have to listen to them doing those grand talks. A good quiz for them would be the meaning of the brand name, "Dolobid". If they can answer it then they pass. If not, then they belong to the crop of Barbies and Kens.
Click to expand...

the "bid" in "Dolobid" is for twice daily - which was far better than ibuprufen's t.i.d. dosage and "dolo" is latin for pain or something. Not all of us around here are newby wannabees.
 




Anonymous said:
Think about the Kodak of 40 years ago. The Merck of today isn't even close to 1970's Kodak relative size or value. Kodak's share price has declined 99% since then. Of course, Merck will be taken out before that happens, but you get my drift. Both became hollow shells of formerly great innovation giants. Kodak was and Merck is now, unable to attract the talent (and would be unable to direct them anyway if they could) required to turn it around. Kodak held its rank and postured as a great company for at least 15 years after this peak but the writing was on the wall during that whole period - a period when there was no commercial China and Wall Street was not so cut-throat. Pharmas only have come to their exalted valuation in the last 25 years and only part of the reason for it is innovation. The other is their extortionate pricing and aggressive lobbying in the US, something that cannot go on forever. It turns out that even bribing congressmen is not sustainable once you lose your patent protection. Selling modern medicine worldwide to poor suckers that earn $1/day is not the business model that got Merck to peak above $90/share nor is it a business model that it can survive with. Maybe a firm that can truly cut costs could survive there - someone like Cipla - but not Merck. Today Merck is posturing only - because it has lost the real things that made it great - believe me. Inside information that most of us live every day. Too big to fail?
Click to expand...

You speak the truth. The soul of Merck is bringing medicine to people. This is what made generations of us tick and feel proud. The first in class. The best in class. Since we stopped having that innovation edge - and you could argue the entire industry lost it - the game became about sales and revenue, not about bringing medicine to people. And now you have leaders saying bringing "affordable" medicine to people which makes us a lousy generic company that does not know how to work the generics business. The latest clinical study will always be far more exciting than generic dollars so the answer becomes fire the old guard and hire street-wise pill-pushers. I'd like to see this once great company survive the past decade of bad MRL and become great again. I don't know how a lawyer or a marketer could make it happen but I'd like them to succeed. This is Mother Merck. My Mother Merck.
 




Anonymous said:
Obama care will mean generics and care cuts. Have you seen the cost of a policy lately?
Click to expand...

70 years ago there were pathetically therapies for anything, outside of Traditional Chinese Medicine and other culture's folk remedies. I had aunts and grandparens that died young simply because their conditions, easily treatable today, had no remedy then. Today we have an embarassment of options to treat many diseases, although there are still glaring gaps in the available therapies.

The WHO publishes a long list of essential medicines, almost all of which are available in generic form. A link is provided.

http://www.who.int/selection_medicines/committees/expert/17/sixteenth_adult_list_en.pdf

The ever-increasing price of marginally better medicines in the US is incompatible with reducing health care spending, but people are not going to demand less therapy. They will get used to using generics, similar to what the WHO recommends for third-world markets just as surely as they are getting more comfortable using Brand-X over the counter medicines. Unless big pharma can figure out how to provide these therapies and to provide them cheaply, they will eventually have to give up the ghost in this business.
 




Kodak was the king of photography but missed the digital photography market. Then she entered the market late and chose to produce mostly easy to use digital cameras only. When digital photography was relatively a new term, Kodak sold quite a bit of these easy to use digital cameras. But it did not continue to innovate. The Japanese got into the high end and now sell cheaply priced low end models too. Kodak, at least in the digital photography market, is really a low-end brand name. Do you see any similarities between Merck and Kodak?
 




Anonymous said:
This is the same story with any generic competitor. Bad economy means people have no money. All the pharmas are giving big discount coupons.
Click to expand...

What I find interesting is that despite this "bad economy", restaurants all over are bustling, dept stores / malls are crowded (even on a weekday during work hours), people are not just looking, but buying...movie theatres are doing well....so people have money to dump....but when it comes to their prescriptions, they want it all for nothing.
 




Top Bottom
Back
Quote