Principal author W.Scott Evangelista suggests that drug companies must incorporate commercial considerations earlier in the development process, build superior data management capabilities and develop a more target approach to sales to boost ROI.
Evangelista argues that drug firms should follow the life insurance industry “which replaced captive sales forces with third party agents that objectively represent multiple companies.”
These ideas will be music to the ears of the contract sales and marketing sector, which has long emphasised such strategies and capabilities as its key strengths.
How widely such an approach is adopted by the drug industry, if at all, is another question. However, given the trend to outsoruce activities like R&D and manufacturing in recent years, coupled with recent cuts to sales forces by most Big Pharmas, it seems clear that the drug industry is open to all strategies that will improve efficiency and reduce costs.
The full Deloitte document can be read here.