Bloom and blight

摘要

For an industry that prides itself on innovation, firms with promising new drugs in development are surprisingly rare. By the end of this year, Lehman Brothers, an investment bank, expects global drugmakers to have launched 47 new drugs, a third fewer than in 1997. Many firms face yawning gaps in their pipelines of drugs at a late stage of development. Yet Eli Lilly, based in Indianapolis, is poised to launch at least four novel drugs next year, with total potential annual sales of more than $5.5 billion (see chart). This is ample reason to be optimistic about a firm that this week issued lacklustre results and another profit warning. Much of the firm's innovative edge is attributed to Sidney Taurel, a globe-trotting European whose exotic background and urbane manner make him a far cry from the average mid-western executive. Like his fellow pharma boss, Raymond Gilmar-tin at Merck, Mr Taurel has avoided the industry addiction to mergers since becoming chief executive in 1998. He thinks that size can do more harm than good in Pharmaceuticals, since giants take more energy to grow than leaner creatures. He says that American medicine would have to alter dramatically through, say, widespread price controls, before a sharp change in Lilly's course made sense.