Why I love generics – and always have

A few weeks back, I wrote about how excited I am to return to “cool Germany” after a decade in Singapore. My number one reason for moving back: I was offered my dream job, running the company I used to work for. Now that really was cool!

I’ve spent a lifetime in the pharmaceutical industry, working on both sides of the “patent fence” – innovation-driven companies and generic medicine makers -- but my heart has always been with the generics business. In my last job, at one of the world’s largest branded pharma companies, I was still known as “the generics guy”: constantly looking for new ways to expand the reach of important medicines in the later stages of their lifecycle.

Why do I love generics? Well, three things come to my mind. I would call them the “Three P’s”.

The Pace: Every day is different

In many ways, working in generics is more like FMCG (fast-moving consumer goods) than healthcare. Make no mistake: it’s a tough business and highly competitive. Patients and healthcare systems want the best for the lowest price. And generics combines the regulatory and market volatility of the high-tech industry with the speed and logistic complexity of supermarket chains. So every day brings new challenges en route to delivering people the medicines they need at the prices they can afford.

The companies that succeed in the long term are those with a true “generic mindset”: constantly focused on how to beat the competition by getting both cost and quality right, day in, day out. But what really drives that mindset is a fine mix of intellectual agility and common sense: deciding what problem you’re trying to solve, making a decision, implementing it and moving on. Oh, and course correcting when you get it wrong, which will happen most days in some part of your business, because that’s life...

The Purpose: Generics make a difference

It may be stating the obvious, but I’ll take that risk: generic medicines really do make a difference for hundreds of millions of people worldwide, by driving patient access to affordable, high-quality healthcare. Take the example of Europe, where two in every three medicines dispensed are generics, but they account for just 29% of total expenditure. Without generic competition, providing Europeans with the same level of access would cost an extra 100 billion euros annually. (Fun fact: that’s more than double the estimated size of Britain’s “Brexit exit bill”, year in, year out. But let’s not go there...)  And it’s not just about access today – possibly the most important thing that generics do is to help keep healthcare systems sustainable in the long run, by creating “headroom” for spending on innovative, often more expensive, medicines.

The Passion: It’s fun to work with people who love their jobs

Which brings me to the third “P”, passion. The vast majority of people in my organization, at least at some level, come to work every day because they truly believe that what they do makes the world a better place. At Sandoz, it is pioneering access for patients, and this is what our teams feel passionate for. The common purpose really does bind us together and gives us a true sense of direction. Nothing beats working with people who love their jobs – even on those days when they might have good reason to believe the opposite!

That’s what motivates me. I’d love to hear what motivates you, even if you aren’t lucky enough to work in the generics industry!