Prioritizing Patients Over Profits

Imagine a pharmaceutical company that distributes all profits to patient support and medical research... Enter For Benefit Medicines (FBM), established by Dr Barry Frost, in partnership with John Hurley. Frost holds a PhD in pharmacology and has spent 35 years working for four different major pharmaceutical companies. With a rich and varied experience in pharma, it has been the ‘for benefit’ model that has interested him most over the past few years. After reading an article in the Harvard Business Review (November 2011 edition) entitled “The For Benefit Enterprise,” Frost was intrigued by the documented case studies that enhanced his evolving vision. To take this concept to the next level, we decided to look at the idea of whether we could develop a model where the patient in a given disease state could actually have a say and help others now, and in the future, by supporting a brand or a series of brands that funded patient support. The opening paragraph of the article reads as follows: “We are in a new era. For-profit businesses are tackling social and environmental issues, nonprofits are developing sustainable business models, and governments are forging market-based approaches to service delivery. Out of this blurring of traditional boundaries, a different model of enterprise is emerging, driven by entrepreneurs who are motivated by social aims.” This dovetailed perfectly with Frost’s thinking. He discovered that the ‘for benefit’ model has been used...
Source: EyeForPharma - Category: Pharmaceuticals Authors: Source Type: news