Pfizer, Roche, and Huizhi's structural changes attract attention!

Recently, less than a month after Peng Zhenke returned to Pfizer, he announced drastic adjustments to Pfizer China's organizational structure, which became the focus of the industry.
Among them, all the heads of the six major business units competed for posts and became a hot spot
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Combined with the organizational changes and adjustments of Roche Pharmaceuticals, Huizhi Pharmaceutical and other companies some time ago, the focus of the industry has shifted to issues such as volume procurement and how foreign pharmaceutical companies respond to medical insurance negotiations

What is the core logic of the adjustment of the organizational structure of multinational pharmaceutical companies as the general environment of the pharmaceutical industry changes? How do you view the response strategies of major companies? Is Pfizer's bidding for posts a major subversion of the industry's existing rules for useful people? Let us take a break from the case analysis and find the truth about the transformation
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Pfizer China replicates the global structure

Pfizer China replicates the global structure

There are three main points of China's organizational reform announced by Pfizer this time: First, six independent business units were established, namely hospital emergency, tumor, rare diseases, inflammation and immunity, vaccines, and broad markets
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This setting is almost a copy of the company's global structure in China.

Second, the establishment of the Strategic Innovation Department
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This is also the continuation of Pfizer's global strategy

Third, the company’s official website reports did not mention it, but many reports mentioned that the heads of the six business units will all adopt a competitive recruitment system.
All employees who have been in Pfizer’s current position for more than 24 months can compete for employment without having to get a superior manager.
Prior approval
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The heads of the divisions compete for posts, which is relatively common in domestic-funded enterprises

Previously, Pfizer had only two business units with corresponding persons in charge, namely the general manager in charge of the anti-infection business and the general manager in charge of the oncology and rare disease business
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After this reorganization, the anti-infection business was transferred to the hospital emergency business, and the oncology and rare diseases business was split into two divisions, oncology and rare diseases

However, this restructuring will inevitably weaken the roles of chief operating officer and vice president of marketing in the previous organizational structure.
The chief operating officer set by pharmaceutical companies is often trained as a president candidate.
The addition of Peng Zhenke and the six business units directly report to the president mechanism.
The establishment of the COO makes the role of the chief operating officer subtle
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At the same time, the vice president of marketing is in charge of the positioning of the cross-brand marketing strategy.

Huizhi embraces digitalization

Huizhi embraces digitalization

At the same time as Pfizer's structural reform, there is also the new organizational structure setting of Roche Pharmaceuticals and Huizhi not long ago
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Roche has established a new China product pipeline strategy team, which will directly report to the general manager of Roche Pharmaceuticals; Huizhi has newly established two teams of digital therapy and health management platform, both of which will directly report to the president of Huizhi China

Both of these adjustments are adjustments to functional departments, which are much smaller than Pfizer China's direct adjustment of the business team
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Of course, Huizhi China completed the reorganization of the business team structure as early as the beginning of the establishment of the company in 2020, and the establishment of three organizations: the hospital business department, the retail business department and the Internet medical business department, and the action was very large

The core positioning of Roche’s new team is company strategy formulation, strategic insights and analysis, product excellence listing, disease field integration strategy, and competitive information collection and analysis.
The main line of these functions is to help Roche Pharmaceuticals communicate and connect with global product development.
Under the market changes of blockbuster biosimilars such as rituximab and trastuzumab for injection, the market has helped Roche China to better and faster introduce Roche's new global products
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Huizhi's actions are very innovative, exploring and embracing digitalization.
Among all multinational pharmaceutical companies, Huizhi has the best conditions to explore digital innovation and transformation
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Unlike other mainstream pharmaceutical companies that are positioning innovative drugs, Huizhi sells generic drugs and original research drugs, and the profit margins of these products will gradually be compressed to very meager
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For enterprises, using digitalization to improve operational efficiency and improve user experience has become a must
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Huizhi has previously explored the path of cooperating with Yidu Cloud for Internet hospitals through the establishment of an Internet medical business department.
After quick trial and error, it quickly adjusted its direction to more specific digital therapy and health management
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For Huizhi, a multinational pharmaceutical company with talent advantages, as long as the strategic direction remains unchanged, it will definitely be able to find a practical and feasible path to land
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Where is the core logic of the transformation?

Where is the core logic of the transformation?

In recent years, under the promotion of national policies, mass procurement, and medical insurance reforms, the business model of traditional multinational pharmaceutical companies relying on original research drugs is no longer feasible.
Multinational pharmaceutical companies have also abandoned the mass procurement policy.
"The fluke mentality
.
Excluding a few companies that are positioned as original research drugs and generic drugs like Huizhi, most multinational pharmaceutical companies have a clear understanding of the situation and firmly shifted to the development of innovative drugs
.
Although the strategic direction is clear, the research and development of innovative drugs is often calculated in ten years.
It takes several years for existing drugs to be introduced into the Chinese market from the world.
Strategic adjustments often last for several years, and turbulence in the adjustment process is inevitable
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For multinational pharmaceutical companies that are positioning innovative drugs, the impact of business structure adjustments is not large.
The organizational structure established for many years to sell original research drugs as innovative drugs is still feasible in the New Deal era
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The mainstream structure is either a business unit system that governs market and sales, or a structure that separates market and sales and sets up separate marketing functions.
Both models have their rationality.
The CEOs of multinational pharmaceutical companies are based on people, time, and circumstances.
Set up the corresponding organizational structure, adopt one of the two modes, or a mixture or variant of the two modes
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Immediately afterwards, new product introduction, market access, patient payment capabilities, and digitization organizational capabilities have successively become the organizational design areas that are most concerned by multinational pharmaceutical companies outside of marketing and sales capabilities
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Needless to say, the introduction of new products.
The Chinese product pipeline strategy team of Roche Pharmaceuticals is a typical case.
Another case is that AstraZeneca has set up a special NPP (New Product Planning) team under the division.
Some team NPP leaders even Given the level of executive director, the emphasis on the introduction of new products can be seen
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Whether the product can enter the national medical insurance and how to complete the product entering the hospital as soon as possible after entering the medical insurance has become the key to increasing the volume of the new product after the market.
Therefore, it has opened up the past cross-team government at all levels, market access and even the key customer team, and established a joint large access Team has become an organization design favored by multinational pharmaceutical companies in recent years
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This is probably also the background of the era when Bian Xin, who is responsible for market access, was able to take the helm of Roche Pharmaceuticals.
In the past, this channel was only open to candidates who had served as vice president of the business unit
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The importance of patients’ ability to pay is related to the fact that oncology drugs and rare disease drugs have become the main research and development directions of innovative pharmaceutical companies.
In addition to national medical insurance, how to build a multi-level medical security system through charity projects and commercial insurance cooperation has become the key
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However, the solution to the ability to pay is currently mainly dependent on national medical insurance, and charitable donations are mainly through cooperation with large foundations and associations.
Many of these capabilities are placed in government or access-related teams
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A few multinational pharmaceutical companies still have some positions in charge of commercial insurance, which are also mainly placed in government affairs or access teams.
Pfizer placed it in the Strategic Innovation Department alone this time, which is a relatively innovative move
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Of course, digitization is also an area of ​​more concern
.
Many companies, such as AstraZeneca, Sanofi, and Merck, have set up positions at the vice president level to supervise digitalization related work
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However, for multinational companies positioning innovative drugs, the direct help of digitalization is not as direct as the previous capabilities
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We look forward to the success of digital transformation in companies like Huizhi, and provide innovative pharmaceutical companies with more learning output
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