Resources
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From time to time we publish new and interesting articles, which are available here for you to download as pdf files. We respectfully request that you register with us in order to access them.
Developing Value-based Strategies (article)
Published in Strategy magazine March 2008
Companies face ever increasing regulation and stakeholder scrutiny whilst internally, integrated value chains are fragmenting into complex webs of relationships. Strategy and finance theory and practice have been evolving to confront these challenges; but too slowly - and in different directions.
Since Porter’s seminal work in the 1980’s, strategy has meandered– e.g. business excellence, TQM, BPR, core competencies, balanced scorecards, VBM, blue oceans. Whereas all these tools have a place, it is no wonder that managers are now confused about what strategy actually comprises – and how it is to be applied in practice. Strategy needs a new ‘integrating philosophy’.
Finance by contrast has developed rigorous mathematical approaches to value and risk management but, in the process, has become less transparent to the layman-manager. Advanced financial tools are no substitute for sound business planning. Finance needs to become more integrated with the underlying strategy and structure of the business.
Strategy and finance operate with completely different mindsets but the two disciplines need each other as never before – and both disciplines need to be more accessible to a wider range of managers and stakeholders.
Register/login to downloadDeveloping Real Value in Pharma (article)
Published in Business Development and Licensing Journal Jan 2009
By definition, pharmaceutical portfolios erode. So as conventional pipelines dry up it is intrinsically harder to continue to grow (or to avoid decline) except by
acquiring technologies from other companies. So the fundamentals of pharmaceuticals are changing. The challenge is to develop and apply a transparent, structural, resource-based approach for value-based strategy and investment decision making.
Sophisticated financial valuation tools (DCF, real options, etc) are applied to evaluate individual projects and investment portfolios. But they are very opaque to managers who need to understand the potential value of multiple and interdependent strategy options. Conventional financial tools do not – and fundamentally cannot alone – represent the dynamic interdependencies implicit in pharmaceutical portfolio management.