Is anyone else feeling a sense of déjà vu? Once again, we're witnessing a pharmaceutical giant fumble a multi-million dollar acquisition, leaving us all wondering: who on earth is advising these companies?
In a move that can only be described as face-palm worthy, Pfizer has just pulled the plug on sisunatovir, the crown jewel of its $525 million ReViral acquisition. You read that right – half a billion dollars, down the drain. And for what? A drug that apparently can't play nice with antacids. I mean, come on!
Let's break this down, shall we?
Pfizer buys ReViral for a cool $525 million in 2022.
The main attraction? Sisunatovir, an oral RSV treatment.
Fast forward to 2024, and Pfizer's ditching the drug due to "ongoing challenges."
Now, I'm no pharmaceutical expert, but shouldn't these "ongoing challenges" have been, oh I don't know, identified BEFORE dropping half a billion dollars on an acquisition? It's not like drug-drug interactions are some obscure, unheard-of phenomenon in pharma research.
But wait, it gets better! This isn't even the first asset from the ReViral buyout that Pfizer's tossed in the trash. Last year, they discarded another RSV candidate, PF-07923567. At this rate, they might as well have set fire to a pile of cash – at least that would've generated some heat.
The question that keeps nagging at me is: How do these corporate leaders continue to make such colossal blunders and get away with it? Where's the accountability? If I made a $525 million mistake at my job, I'd be out on the street faster than you can say "antacid interaction."
Yet, in the world of Big Pharma, it seems to be just another day at the office. A spokesperson blandly states they're "focusing efforts on other investigational therapeutics." Translation: "Oops, we goofed. Moving on!"
Is this the new normal? Are we supposed to just shrug our shoulders and accept that half-billion dollar mistakes are par for the course? Because if so, I think I'm in the wrong line of work.
To all the pharma execs out there: Maybe next time, before you reach for your checkbook, reach for a high school chemistry textbook instead. It might save you a few hundred million dollars – and save the rest of us from another incredulous blog post about corporate incompetence.
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