The List of Discarded Prescriptions That Moved President Wei

Licensing partnerships between pharmaceutical companies (license-in and license-out) primarily involved the licensing of drug patents.

Among all technological fields, the pharmaceutical industry was the most dependent on intellectual property. Both domestic and foreign pharmaceutical companies protected pharmaceutical IP throughout the entire drug research and development process.

Products had to be developed, and patents had to keep pace—or even come first—so that market profits could ultimately be secured through the exclusivity of drug patents.

The basic principle of patent filing strategy was to complete product patents early on, especially core patents related to compounds, so that comprehensive pharmacological and toxicological research could be conducted later. Process patents and use patents could be filed in the later stages of new drug development.

During the stage of discovering new active compounds, patent applications mainly included compound patents—covering generic formulas and specific compounds—which were the most valuable patents among new drug patents.

As pharmacological and toxicological research progressed, patent applications at this stage began building peripheral patents, including crystal-form patents, active compound salts, esters, isomers, hydrates or solvates, and so on.

At this point, the patent pool for the new compound began to take shape.

During the clinical stage, as clinical trials deepened and experimental data accumulated, patent applications often included composition patents, various dosage-form patents, process patents, and use patents.

After a new drug was successfully launched, patent applications at this stage mainly focused on new composition patents, new dosage-form patents, and new use patents, in order to further expand patent exclusivity and extend the drug's life cycle.

These were common patent filing strategies for different stages of research. In actual patent filings, there was often overlap. For instance, process patents for new compounds could be filed during preclinical research, clinical research, and after launch. Overall, it was a long-term and dynamic process.

So, immediately after successfully testing the drug on himself, Wei Kang applied for the new drug's compound patent. During the subsequent clinical stage, he continued filing a series of applications, including composition patents. Patent applications for after the drug's launch were still being prepared. In short, all patent filings were proceeding steadily according to the drug approval process.

Only by possessing this entire portfolio of patents for the new drug could he enter licensing partnerships with other companies.

Wei Kang carefully reviewed the latest partnership proposals sent over by Pfizer, Bayer, and Johnson & Johnson after their discussions.

The three companies were evenly matched in strength, and the terms they offered were also the best among the multinational giants.

The other companies either already had enough anti-cancer drugs of their own, had recently acquired new pharmaceutical companies, or had undergone asset swaps and business restructuring, leaving them temporarily unable to offer more favorable terms.

After Bayer's €10 billion buyout offer got out, Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson both revised their proposals and added buyout prices. Although neither could match Bayer's offer, their terms in other areas were more favorable.

After analyzing the relevant information on the three companies, he had gained a general understanding.

Bayer truly wanted to buy out this drug formula, so its proposal relied more on throwing money at the deal.

However, Pfizer's Andre secretly revealed some information to Wei Kang that only insiders at the pharmaceutical giants knew.

Bayer was also developing its own Broad-Spectrum Anti-Cancer Drug and had already achieved some results. Its clinical efficacy, however, was far from satisfactory. That was why it was so eager to buy out the drug formula. It might want to bring it back for analysis and pursue both approaches at once, developing the product itself as much as possible rather than forming a deep partnership with Sanqing.

Johnson & Johnson's anti-cancer drug pipeline was not particularly large, but its products were highly competitive. Because an anti-cancer drug for soft tissue tumors that it had spent enormous sums developing had been denied approval by the US FDA for six years, it now urgently needed a powerful star product to seize the market. Its desire for Sanqing's Broad-Spectrum Anti-Cancer Drug was therefore equally intense.

Pfizer, on the other hand, had an extensive oncology product line and no shortage of new drugs. Yet in certain treatment fields, its products ranked poorly and lacked competitiveness. Relying on only one or two flagship products to compete with other pharmaceutical companies was extremely disadvantageous in the long run. Thus, it was equally determined to secure a blockbuster product like the Broad-Spectrum Anti-Cancer Drug and would never give up.

In summary, although Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer were both powerful, each had its shortcomings. Overall, Pfizer was slightly weaker and more sincere about pursuing a long-term partnership.

It made sense. Pfizer's product line was broad, but it was not especially competitive. When it came time to sell drugs, it would certainly be more willing to push Sanqing's medicine for the sake of sales volume.

Johnson & Johnson had merely suffered a setback for now, and its own drugs were also very strong. If its own anti-cancer drugs could be launched, it might no longer devote much effort to developing Sanqing's market.

As for Bayer, it had already been quietly eliminated in Wei Kang's mind.

Wei Kang rubbed his brow and continued analyzing the licensing partnership proposals from the two companies.

Johnson & Johnson's proposal was: a $500 million upfront payment, up to $3 billion in cumulative development and commercial milestone payments, and tiered royalties based on net global sales, with the total deal value estimated at $3.5 billion.

Pfizer's proposal was: a $500 million upfront payment, eligibility to receive up to $2 billion upon reaching regulatory milestones, a $500 million payment upon reaching cumulative sales milestones, and a share of future sales in the licensed territories.

At first glance, the amounts offered by the two proposals did not seem very different. Johnson & Johnson even appeared to be offering somewhat more money.

But Johnson & Johnson's subsequent payments were tiered royalties based on net global sales, while Pfizer offered a share of sales in the licensed territories.

Wei Kang mainly wanted to sell drugs in the US and other developed countries, because he could not gain a foothold there himself, and Chinese companies could easily be targeted.

But this planet also had vast numbers of developing Third World countries, where Chinese companies were still relatively strong. He did not want to casually surrender most of those markets.

Pfizer, by comparison, was not nearly as greedy. It only sought to sell in the developed countries covered by the license. The two sides would jointly develop the market in those countries, with Pfizer responsible for regulatory filings and commercial operations after approval was obtained.

In addition, Sanqing Pharmaceutical could jointly sell the product in other developed countries outside the US and share in the sales revenue, with Pfizer providing part of the operating funds.

Thus, it was already obvious which proposal was better.

Of course, this assessment was based on Sanqing's ambitions for the global market. If Sanqing only wanted to collect money and had no intention of developing markets alongside its partner, then Johnson & Johnson's proposal would also be an excellent choice. It would only need to sit back and collect the money.

Wei Kang then turned to the lists of abandoned drug formulas attached to the partnership proposals from the various pharmaceutical companies.

This was what truly won Wei Kang over to Pfizer's side.

Johnson & Johnson and the other pharmaceutical companies were all much the same. They had attached more than a dozen abandoned drug formulas, ranging from anti-tumor drugs and AIDS treatments to anti-thrombotic drugs and even wound-care formulas.

Moreover, as Wei Kang had requested, they had all marked the side effects already discovered, along with detailed data.

But Wei Kang guessed that they had probably concealed some side effects, because certain drugs had been discontinued despite their side effects not being severe.

Of course, there was another possibility: the drugs' therapeutic effects were simply too poor, or even nonexistent, so they had been abandoned.

Those drug formulas were useless in other people's hands, but Wei Kang could turn waste into treasure with them.

As long as toxicology testing and human tolerability passed, even if the original research direction had produced no results, Wei Kang could extract a new highly effective drug from the side effects.

However, many drugs had side effects that were rather useless, such as irritation to internal organs. While they could yield things like emetics or anti-diarrheal drugs, those markets were small, their uses were unimportant, and there were already countless existing varieties, so they would not make much money.

Only drugs capable of treating fatal diseases were true gold mines that could make pharmaceutical companies rich.

The abandoned drug formulas also revealed the main research directions of the major pharmaceutical companies.

Every pharmaceutical company had invested heavily in anti-cancer drugs, naturally with different areas of focus.

For example, blood cancers, lung cancer, lymphoma, melanoma, and so on.

There were also many other abandoned formulas from different R&D directions, covering virtually every aspect related to the human body's organs.

The sheer number of formulas made Wei Kang's eyes swim, and quite a few of the side effects caught his interest.

He decided to have a proper talk with these pharmaceutical companies. Since they were already here, they might as well package everything up and sell it to him.

After all, these abandoned formulas had all been carefully selected by the companies themselves—useless trash with no practical value.

Pfizer's catalog of abandoned formulas was especially eye-catching, simply because there were so many of them.

It seemed that after learning of his fondness for collecting abandoned formulas, the company had catered to his tastes, packaging up not only the discarded new drug formulas from its headquarters laboratory, but also those from the laboratories of every pharmaceutical company it had acquired or merged with.

Dr. Andre must have put in quite a bit of effort behind the scenes.

Worthy of being the number one pharmaceutical company in the universe.

What was a multinational pharmaceutical giant?

This was one!

A full hundred or more abandoned formulas!

All of them had been packaged up and sent over.

The categories were incredibly detailed, even including over-the-counter formulas for skin itchiness, cough syrup, eye drops, and the like.

But Wei Kang did not care about any of that. All he wanted was to hug Dr. Andre and properly thank him for the assist.

He was simply too thoughtful!