Who Are The Most Influential People In Pharma?
9 CommentsBy Ed Silverman // May 22nd, 2008 // 9:23 am
Depends who you ask, of course. But everyone seems to love a list and so the latest ranking from a trade magazine offers an interesting - some may say curious - mix of ceo’s, politicians, regulators, scientists, academics and trade group types.
There was no special ranking for controverisal, but Glaxo’s newly retired ceo JP Garnier got as high as No. 22 and Fred Hassan, who runs Schering-Plough, was named No. 32. The FDA’s Janet Woodcock garnered the 18th position, although her boss, the beleaguered FDA commish Andy von Eschenbach, didn’t rank at all. So much for making an impact, Andy. But NICE chair Michael Rawlins ranked No. 5.
Who else scored? Carl Icahn shows up as 26th. Cass Wheeler of the American Heart Association finished at No. 36. Merck’s Dick Clark squeaked in at No. 38. Oh, we almost forgot - Pfizer’s Jeff Kindler is No. 11, no doubt because he influences so many unhappy investors. Here is the complete list and accompanying article.
Nathan
“As judged by industry experts”. What does that mean? Who exactly voted on this list? It’s hard for me to believe that Bill Gates and Bill Clinton have more influence in the industry than nearly all of the CEOs of the top 10 pharma companies.
Jeffrey Young
I think it’s criminal you were left off the list, Ed.
SP 2
I doubt that Fred Hassan will be on the next list as he tries to clean up the mess that is Schering-Plough at this point. Talk about deja vu all over again, I bet that the employees thought they had gotton away from issues, but they just keep on showing up over and over again.
Ed Silverman
Hi Nathan,
If you click on the link provided, you will find the folks who were chosen to compile the list, for better or worse.
By posting the list, by the way, I was not offering an endorsement, but noting something that others may find interesting for any number of reasons.
I will leave it to you and others, perhaps, to determine the validity of including - or excluding - any individuals.
Cheers
ed
CMC guy
Influence could be interpreted either in positive or negative sense. For instance seeing some scientists/researchers I find encouraging however the number of politicians and financial types is troubling. I would probably place most CEOs in the latter group. The Gates might be an exception as what their Foundation is attempting to do could have powerful postive impacts.
Nathan
At first I didn’t see the judges for this list. Now I found them. Here is our esteemed list of 5 “expert” judges that composed this list:
1) Agnes Klein — director of a French radiopharmaceutical company.
2) Clive Savage — director of corporate communication for IMS.
3) Michael Santoro — professor of business, Rutgers
4) Andrew Jack — pharmaceutical correspondent for Financial Times.
5) Andrew Tunnicliffe - editor of “World Pharmaceutical Frontiers”.
Here’s my question: What makes ANY of these 5 individuals qualified to judge who is and isn’t influential in the pharma industry? It isn’t clear that any of these guys have significant knowledge of the inner workings of big pharma.
Ed Silverman
Hi Nathan,
That’s a fair question and I confess I don’t know why these individuals were chosen. I do happen to know Mike Santoro and, in fact, ran a Q&A with him three months ago. You can read that here…
http://www.pharmalot.com/2008/02/message-to-pharma-get-out-of-china-now/
But as I mentioned, it’s a list and running lists is a favorite activity in the media simply because these things get reactions, for better or worse. Perhaps we should compile one of those on Pharmalot. If I do, I’ll need some real experts to help me, too.
Cheers
ed
Insider
Great idea Ed.
Insider
ps I particularly love the description of Fred Hassan.
LOL