Quiz time! See if you can match up these pharmaceutical companies with the country where they are headquartered (answers below):
1) Novartis
2) Pfizer
3) Novo Nordisk
4) GlaxoSmithKline
5) Sanofi-Aventis
_________________________
a.) United Kingdom
b.) Switzerland
c.) Denmark
d.) France
e.) United States
Modern pharmaceuticals may have humble beginnings, but since the invention of penicillin and insulin back in the 1920s and 1930s, worldwide manufacturing and distribution of medicines quickly ensued. Today the need for pharmaceutical companies to go global is stronger than ever.
In the spirit of the pharmaceutical industry, I’m going to diagnose why pharmas need to think globally and what ℞ makes sense from a network perspective.
The Symptoms
- First, growth. Pharmas need to expand sales efforts into emerging markets to supplement shrinking revenues from traditional markets that are being jeopardized by governments aiming to decrease healthcare expenditures (and by generics as patents expire). See top three trends for 2012.
- Second, efficiency. Pharmaceutical companies need to connect disparate R&D, sales teams and partners operating around the globe. This is becoming more prevalent as companies look to diversify R&D research by pursuing M&A and partnership activities particularly in India and China.
- And lastly, security and risk management. Implementing global business continuity and disaster recovery (BCDR) strategies is becoming increasingly critical as security requirements intensify and as pharmaceutical executives focus on security and disaster recovery solutions as key priorities.
Pharmaceutical companies are facilitating corporate growth by entering new markets. Yet as the number of emerging markets grows, worldwide teams need to share massive data sets collaboratively, and BCDR requirements elevate. Planning and executing for this global network can be a daunting challenge.
So, what is the right network prescription for all of these competing and important requirements?
Just as pharmaceutical companies are looking to focus on their core competencies, network providers need to demonstrate four key core competencies to be an effective global partner.
The Prescription
- Security. Your network partner must demonstrate secure connectivity solutions, high reliability offer options, and secure systems and processes, as well as a solid track record of delivering against the high security requirements of global pharmaceutical companies.
- Global reach and the ability to scale — from both a geographic standpoint as your market connections evolve and from a bandwidth perspective as your network needs grow.
- Your network provider needs to have the technical expertise and resources to design to your unique latency and diversity needs. Every network is unique and network design is critical to performance.
- Finally, as pharmaceutical companies simplify their IT infrastructure supplier list to realize efficiencies, make sure your network partner has a broad enough solution portfolio to meet your evolving voice, Internet, data and video needs. This will help streamline your operational processes and maximize your purchasing power within the business partnership.
Recap
The economic landscape for pharmaceuticals is more global than ever. As companies strive to create and maintain competitive differentiation and capture new global market share, the network they rely on should enable sustained, secure and collaborative growth. And the right diagnosis and prescription of communications solutions can help organizations achieve this market dominance.
Answers: 1) b 2) e 3) c 4) a 5) d
About Karin Ratchinsky
