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MRL







No. Layoffs are the furthest thing from our minds here at R&D. We wouldn't allow anything to destroy our focus in any case. And we are grateful to our management for fostering the environment that makes this attitude possible. We have heard rumorsthat throughout the organization layoffs are about the only thing anyone talks about anymore. Thankfully, running the numbers to meet headcount reduction requests would only backfire if applied to R&D and the company knows it.
 




Folks in MRL a feeling a little bit "better" following Ken Frazier's comments on supporting R+D as the "future" of the Company. That said, all these "warm and fuzzy" feelings should / will dry up and blow away if the arbitration with JNJ goes poorly for Merck.
 




Agreed. If MRL continues to not produce any revenue generating products, there will be change. It won't be a favorable outcome for MRL employees.
Supporting highly paid scientists with sparkles in their eyes lasts only so long. If the shareholders' expectations on revenues and profits continue to not be met, it'll be time to seek out that teaching gig at a community college.
 




If MRL doesn't produce any revenue generating products, then who will? No one else in the industry or in acedemia is coming up with anything, and i haven't seen anything to support licensing and mergers to obtain a pipeline. So if MRL doesn't do it, we might as well close up shop.
Pharma companies will live and die by their R&D successes or failures. Having the best sales/marketing/manufacturing does nothing if you have no products to work with. I hope MRL becomes successful again, because we all depend on it.
 




It might be valuable for all the naysayers out there to differentiate between the dedication and talent of many / most of MRL's "bench level" scientists versus the ineffective and, in many cases, incompetent, leaders who dictate where they MUST focus their efforts....
 








How much MRL leadership has any idea about how to run a successful and value-adding research program since it has been so many years since one existed at MRL? Add to that task, turning around the present stagnant demoralized organization. And it surely will not happen by maintaining their smug, self-congratulatory "I am Merck" attitudes. I have no doubt that there are many good and valuable scientists and technical experts trying to make careers (and a difference) at MRL but why would anyone that isn't already stuck there want to join? It is this inability to attract talent that will kill off Merck. It will take years but it is surely happening. The only long-term solution is to invest heavily in R&D - but only after those whose attitude makes R&D investment a waste of cash are moved aside. Given the general cluelessness of the corporate management and BOD, don't count on that happening anytime soon. Humility and self-sacrifice are called for in MRL - mostly at the leadership levels.

Potential layoffs are an ever-present fact of life at Merck, whether in MRL or not. Everyone, everywhere has that as their number one personal issue. As each business model gets tried and tossed, more - not less - displacement can be expected. Every job is subject to outsourcing or contract. Loyalty anyone?
 




MRL has been a black hole for cash in recent years. We've been buying our successful products and watching our home-grown ones falter. In short, MRL has become a poor investment.

The cuts are coming. It's only a question of how soon.
 








I can see MRK becoming much more 'pfizer-like' in its approach to discovery and commercial products; outsourcing the R&D portions and if anything comes up late phase it likes, buy it.
 




It might be valuable for all the naysayers out there to differentiate between the dedication and talent of many / most of MRL's "bench level" scientists versus the ineffective and, in many cases, incompetent, leaders who dictate where they MUST focus their efforts....

B##SH#T; as posted in the 16,000 to be let go thread:

Deflecting responsibility are you? What you say is untrue. You must not work for Merck. Bubble-headed researchers who think they are in a university do. Once research is accountable for the guiding the direction of this company, Merck will rise.
Blindly sinking billions of dollars into the dreams of some scientist with a sparkle from researching some gene in his/her eyes will not help our bottom line.
Good luck to you.
 








Both R&D and SG&A have increased as a % of sales over the last 35 years and have been more than offset by dramatically lower % COGS. Some of the lower COGS is volume driven but most reflects merely price increases. That trend of lower COGS is about to bottom out and increase substantially for the industry mostly due to generic erosion of pricing power. The long-term health of the industry requires efficient R&D investment; the short-term requires efficient SG&A investment. Wall Street wants to keep their cut. There will be a lot less to go around. You are fooling yourself if you expect a return to days when being inefficient or fabulously compensated was tolerable. This industry is always slow to react and what we are seeing in the name of cost-cutting is just the (amateurish) start. The problem is that major pharma hasn't developed the first clue about how to operate efficiently. The leadership only wants to re-live the days in fat city. If you are young, find another career. If you are anything but young - life is unfair. Those that are in their 30's can survive in the short-term but the future is far brighter somewhere else - almost anywhere else. Everything consuming revenue (SG&A, R&D, Manufacturing) will end up in the lowest-cost form (outsourced) along with their associated jobs except those select few jobs that manage the outsourcing. That is ... until integrated, efficient competition arrives from China and India over the next 10 years to dispalce this model. Ironically it will arrive in the same form of pharma that the US and EU controlled 100% of 25 years ago.
 








There will be disruption of the highest magnitude once big pharma adopts its outsourced resource model.

At least the ROI will be the same as it is now - near zero.

Not so sure about the actual disruption to society. I wonder exactly what % of afflictions will not have some pharmaceutical therapy that is not generic within the next 5 years. The government and big business are paying for a lot of the drugs today. The political tone in the US suggests that if you are not part of the elite, you are going to have to get used to standard (not cutting edge) service. This means that the standard of care will be generic - take it or leave it. There are lots of good-quality public health systems that use the same model by the way.

For sure there will be a disruption to today's pharma multinational companies, and their traditional model and profitability, especially if that means being able to make money only on cutting edge stuff.

As far as disruption to technology advancement, just like chemistry moved from Germany to the US, UK, and France immediately after WWI, chemistry and technology is moving to Asia. Merck and Co. would never exist in its US-based form if this were not the case. George Merck's career plans after finishing Harvard were to go to Germany to really learn organic chemistry. The emergence of Asia as a land of business opportunity is as disruptive and threatening (or possibility-filled for those placed in Asia) as the emergence of the US in the late 19th - early 20th century was threatening to Europe and positive for Americans.
 




The disruption felt to the research community will be much lower salaries, as big pharma looks for the winners and ignores the losers, instead of funding the (mostly) losers.

Ignore this at your peril.
 




The disruption felt to the research community will be much lower salaries, as big pharma looks for the winners and ignores the losers, instead of funding the (mostly) losers.

Ignore this at your peril.

Please stop already. I know this will happen, but am hoping to stretch it another five years until I retire. Then let the sh!t hit the fan, and research salaries tank.
 








I have been in the belly of the beast and out. It stinks bad! If you want to see improvement in MRL performance, you will have to clean up the whole leadership. Even then it will take time to rebuild a new R&D model to make it efficient and productive.

There are many good scientists in MRL, it's only that the leadership is totally rotten and incompetent, locked in their outdated and rigid way of thinking, totally out of tune with reality. The whole place is run by a mafia led by Peter Kim and his running dogs who only care about consolidating power to accumulate wealth and polishing their golden parachutes. In short, they are like the ugly dictators of the Middle East.

Best of luck to you all.