The antidote
Subtitle: inside the world of new pharma
By: Barry Werth
Edition: First Simon & Schuster hardcover edition.
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2014
Language: eng
Number of pages: 435
ISBN-13: 9781451655667
Subjects: Pharmaceutical industry; Drugs; Vertex Pharmaceuticals Incorporated; Marketing
Description: In 1989, the charismatic Joshua Boger left Merck, then America's most admired business, to found a drug company that would challenge industry giants and transform health care. Journalist Barry Werth described the company's tumultuous early days during the AIDS crisis in The Billion-Dollar Molecule, a celebrated classic of science and business journalism. Now he returns to tell the story of Vertex's bold endurance and eventual success. The pharmaceutical business is America's toughest and one of its most profitable. It's riskier and more rigorous at just about every stage than any other business, from the towering biological uncertainties inherent in its mission to treat disease; to the 30-to-1 failure rate in bringing out a successful medicine; to the multibillion-dollar cost of ramping up a successful product; to operating in the world's most regulated industry, matched only by nuclear power. Werth captures the full scope of Vertex's 25-year drive to deliver breakthrough medicines.--From publisher description.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Machine generated contents note: pt. 1 Feeding the Beast; title: pt. 2 Game Worth the Candle; title: pt. 3 Showtime.