[2008.08.30] 医药业：一统还是纷争

Pharmaceuticals
医药业

Convergence or conflict?
一统还是纷争

Aug 28th 2008 | NEW YORK
From The Economist print edition

Drug giants’ recent attempts to buy big biotech firms have provoked a backlash
医药巨头近期收购生物技术公司的意图引发了强烈的反响

DALLIANCES between conventional pharmaceutical companies and biotechnology firms are nothing new. Big Pharma, eager to refill its emptying drug pipelines, has in recent years looked hopefully to biotech’s upstarts. The drugs giants have pursued all sorts of tie-ups, from alliances to licensing deals to outright purchases of a few smallish companies. But mindful of the sharp cultural differences between the two sorts of firms, they have generally avoided big acquisitions.
传统制药公司和生物技术公司的亲密关系可谓老生常谈了。大型制药公司近些年非常看好生物技术领域中的新贵，因为他们可以填补前者日益匮乏的产品种类。医药巨头们寻求同各种资源建立联系：从授权交易的联盟到直接收购小规模公司。但是由于这两种公司之间的文化差异不仅尖锐，而且非常引人注目，所以他们基本上会尽量避免大规模的并购。

Until now, that is. In recent weeks Roche, a Swiss pharmaceuticals giant, has made a surprise $44 billion bid for the 44% of Genentech, the world’s biggest biotech firm by stockmarket value, that it does not already own; and Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS), an American drugs company, has offered $4.5 billion for the 83% of ImClone, an American biotech firm, that it does not already control. These attempts came on the heels of earlier deals in which AstraZeneca, a British drugs giant, bought MedImmune for $15.6 billion, and Takeda of Japan paid $8.8 billion for Millennium.
那是截至现在的规律，最近瑞士医药巨头罗氏制药公司出人意料的按照股市价值出价440亿美元购买了基因技术公司44%的股份，而后者是全球最大的生物技术公司；当然收购之后所有权已经发生了变化。美国制药企业百时美施贵宝（BMS）用45亿美元收购了从英克隆83%的股份，也得到了对这家生物技术公司的控制权。上述尝试都跟随着前一阵的两次类似收购：英国制药巨头阿斯利康斥资156亿美元收购MedImmune日本的武田药品工业用88亿美元买下千年医药公司。

This frenzy of mergers has been a rare bright spot for investment bankers of late. By one estimate, America saw $60 billion in biotech deals in 2007 and Europe $34 billion. Roger Longman of Windhover, an industry consultancy, notes that the total value of biotech acquisitions by pharmaceutical companies has risen dramatically in the past couple of years (see chart).

这个并购狂潮已经成为近期投资银行家眼中罕见的亮点。据估计，2007年美国实现生物技术交易额600亿美元，欧洲实现了340亿美元。据Roger Longman称，他所在的业内咨询公司Windhover已经注意到，近几年被制药公司对生物科技公司的收购总值有大幅度的上升。（见图）

What explains the spate of big deals? The familiar underlying problem is that Big Pharma is cash-rich but innovation-poor, so it has resorted to buying in bright ideas while it tries to overhaul its business model. Even so, the industry’s new push to acquire large and rather pricey biotech stars is surprising. And the deals seen so far are just the beginning, forecasts Steven Burrill, an industry expert who thinks “the biotech-product ‘land grab’ by Big Pharma” will soon reach “fever pitch”.
巨额交易骤增的原因何在呢？耳熟能详的根本问题在于大型制药公司掌握大量现金，但却亟待创新；于是在尝试进行经营模式革新的时候他会采取大量买进奇思妙想的手段。即便如此，行业内收购昂贵的大型生物技术公司还是令人吃惊的。据业内专家Steven Burrill预测，所有上述的交易目前看来还仅仅是个开始，制药业巨头对生物科技产品的侵占很快会发展到过热的程度。

Corporate aphrodisiacs
公司催情剂

One relatively new factor fuelling the frenzy is regulatory risk. After a series of safety scandals involving Merck’s Vioxx, GlaxoSmithKline’s Avandia and other problem pills, America’s Food and Drug Administration is now decidedly risk-averse. Gobbling up big biotech firms with proven drugs in the marketplace, rather than cheaper but more speculative start-ups, gets around the difficulties of winning regulatory approval for a new drug.
监管风险是推动该浪潮的最新因素。经历了默克公司的止痛药万络、葛兰素史克的文的亚事件等一系列药品丑闻后，目前美国食品和药品管理局坚决的采取了风险规避态度。针对于新药通过审批的难度来说，监管部门更倾向于将大型生物制品公司的成熟产品尽数投入市场，而不是批准低成本的雏形投机到市场中。

Another motivation may be the looming patent-expiry crisis confronting many big drugs companies. As big blockbusters such as Pfizer’s Lipitor go off patent, the industry is about to lose tens of billions of dollars in revenues to generics manufacturers. Biotech drugs provide something of a hedge against this coming calamity, for two reasons. First, they are much harder to copy, so generic equivalents (called “biosimilars”) will be slow in coming. Second, big countries including America do not yet have final regulations set up for approving those copycat drugs, thus bolstering the position of the biotech innovators.
另一个诱因是很多大型制药公司面对着专利即将到期的风险：以辉瑞制药为例，随着专利权的过期，数百亿美元的收入将为通用制造商所拥有。而生物技术制药可以提供抵抗这一灾难的利器，其中原因有二：第一，这些技术非常难摹仿，所以被称为”生物相似药”的普通替代品很难进入市场；第二，包括美国在内的大国还没有最终建立审批那些模仿药品的法规，因此生物技术创新者就由于受到很好支持而处于有利地位。

The drugs giants also have piles of cash. Although they have shovelled billions of dollars back to shareholders, in the form of share buybacks and generous dividends, they have not succeeded in buying the love of Wall Street, which remains gloomy about the industry’s capacity to innovate and worries about possible price-controls on pills. So drugs firms may now have decided to redirect that money into giant acquisitions that could jump-start their innovation machines.
制药巨头们还掌握着大量的现金。虽然他们以回购股份和慷慨的分红等形式向股东回馈了数十亿美元，但此举并未得到华尔街的青睐；后者对于制药行业的创新能力仍然保持悲观态度，并对可能实施的药物价格管控表示忧虑。于是制药公司现在决定干脆把钱重新投入到巨额收购中，至少这样可以对创新机制起到助推启动的作用。

Finally, the weak dollar has made it cheaper for foreigners to take over American firms. Many of today’s acquirers are from outside America, but most of the targets are based in the traditional biotech clusters of California and Massachusetts.
最后，美元的贬值使国外公司接管美国企业的成本更加低廉。现今很多的收购者都来自美国境外，而被收购的目标则集中在传统的生物技术聚集地：加利福尼亚和马塞诸塞。

Alas for Big Pharma, its courtship of biotech has not been met with open arms. As often happens in May-to-December romances, even a well-financed suitor can encounter resistance from the youthful object of desire. The bosses of both Genentech and ImClone have unceremoniously rejected the offers made by their partners. Some suggest that this is mere posturing, designed to fetch a higher sale price. But there is good reason to think that the fight put up by biotech bosses also has a powerful cultural dimension, too. Many detest Big Pharma, and are convinced that selling out to bureaucratic marketing machines will destroy the heart and soul of their smaller, more agile firms.
可怜的制药业巨头，他向生物技术的示爱还没有得到对方欣然的接受。正像老少配爱情经常发生的那样，即使是殷实的求爱者也可能被心仪的年轻目标所拒绝。基因技术公司和从英克隆公司的老板都随随便便地就拒绝了收购的出价。有些人认为这仅仅是做姿态而已，其目的只是为了换取更高的收购价格；但是也有充分的理由相信生物技术公司老板发动的战争也很有文化内涵：很多人憎恶大型制药公司，他们相信如果把公司卖给官僚的市场，那么这些小而灵活的公司必然丧失自身的心神。

Consider Genentech, long viewed as the world’s most successful biotechnology firm. Its independent-minded boffins have flourished under the company’s famously laid-back approach to research and development. They developed Avastin, a breakthrough monoclonal antibody that already earns $4 billion a year as a cancer fighter, and is on track to become the world’s most lucrative drug by 2014. Roche has long recognised the value of that culture, and has wisely remained an arm’s length partner to avoid infecting Genentech with its corporate ways.
基因技术公司长久以来一直被认为是世界上最成功的生物技术公司，由于著名的宽松研发环境而吸引了一大批具有独立思维的科技人员。该公司研发了阿瓦斯丁，一个带有突破意义的单克隆癌症抗体；此举每年可为公司创造40亿美元，而且必将在2014年成为全球活力能力最强的药品。而罗氏公司一直以来就深刻认识到这种文化的价值，所以他很明智的同这个伙伴保持着一定的距离，避免自身的经营方式影响到基因技术公司。

But the Swiss giant has suddenly changed tack. Why? Trials now under way may, it is said, show Avastin to be a useful treatment for earlier stages of colon cancer than the stages it targets today. If those results, which may emerge in the next few months, are indeed positive, then the drug could be worth many billions of dollars more in annual revenue. So Roche may be trying to grab Avastin on the cheap by swooping before those results come out.
不过这个瑞士制药商突然改变了策略。原因在于有实验表明阿瓦斯丁已经超过了既定疗效，对于早期结肠癌可以起到治疗效果。如果这个结果在未来几个月中被证明是确定的，那么该药品给公司带来年收入的增加应该是用数十亿美元计算的。所以罗氏公司应该会在结果公布前速战速决，用较便宜的价格控制住阿瓦斯丁。

The tussle over ImClone has been an altogether messier affair, thanks to Carl Icahn, a legendary corporate raider who owns a stake and is chairman of the firm. Its main product is Erbitux, a cancer drug jointly marketed with BMS that brings in $1.3 billion a year in sales. Rather than selling the entire company to BMS, Mr Icahn wants it split into two bits: one containing Erbitux and the other inheriting ImClone’s future drug-pipeline. He claims BMS used its insider knowledge about his proposal for a split (BMS has its own man on ImClone’s board) to make a pre-emptive bid, so it could buy the firm at a cheaper price. He says a break-up would enhance the firm’s total value. BMS rejects his allegations and insists ImClone would be most valuable if fully integrated into BMS-a notion that sends shivers down the spines of pharma-haters in the biotech camp.
关于从英克隆的争夺更加混乱，这一切都要归功于公司的董事长、传奇的公司操控者–Carl Icahn。该公司的主流产品是与BMS共同营销的抗癌药品艾比特思,每年的销售额达到13亿美元。 Icanhn不希望将公司全部卖给BMS，而是一分为二：一部分包括艾比特思，而另一部分则担负着公司未来产品的研发。他宣称BMS利用内线得到了拆分公司的提议（BMS在从英克隆董事会占有一席之地），并藉此抢先出价，用尽可能低的价钱收购该公司。不过他也表示这个建议可以有效提高公司的总价值。BMS 决绝了他的主张，坚持将从英克隆整体购入以实现最大价值；此理念让生物技术阵营中仇视制药公司的人感到一阵脊梁发凉。

To see how difficult it can be even for Mr Icahn to get his way, look to the saga at Biogen Idec, another American biotech firm in which the gadfly billionaire owns a stake. He is convinced that the firm would be much more valuable as part of a drugs giant rather than an independent firm. So he pushed it to find a buyer. Biogen Idec’s bosses resisted at first, but in the face of lawsuits, boardroom manoeuvring and acrimonious attacks they relented-or so it seemed. Biogen Idec put itself up for sale last year, but the recalcitrant management found clever ways to make the bidding process so onerous and unattractive that nobody made a bid for it.
要想知道Icahn先生实现自己的想法究竟有多难，不妨参考一下美国另一家生物技术公司Biogen Idec的传奇，该公司也有一个烦人的亿万富翁持股。他相信公司成为制药巨头的一部分比独立运作更加有价值，于是开始推动对买家的寻找。公司老板一开始持拒绝态度，但是在法律诉讼、董事会日渐动摇、尖酸的攻击面前，他们退却了，至少看起来是这样。Biogen Idec还是于去年选择了公开出售，不过叛逆的管理层找到了一个明智的方法让出价过程非常的繁琐和乏味，以至于根本没有人愿意出价。

So will Big Pharma’s land-grab succeed, heralding the long-awaited convergence of the two industries? Given how wealthy and desperate the drugs giants are, some deals are inevitable. But many biotech bosses will not give up without a fight.
大型制药企业的圈地是否预示着两大产业期待已久的趋同？鉴于制药巨头的富有和饥渴，有些交易在所难免，但是很多生物技术公司的老板不会选择不战而败。

译者：Tidehunter     http://www.ecocn.org/forum/viewthread.php?tid=13799&extra=page%3D1