Victoria Hale, Medicines360′s CEO, believes the pharmaceutical business model is broken. Hale presented at the Unite for Sight conference in New Haven and informed delegates that pharma companies profit excessively from medicine sales and enourmous marketing budgets shadow R&D expenditure. Furthermore, she believes that society should purchase medicinal products from companies that benefit humanity.
Talking about business models, Hale presented how Medicines360 operates, but if you take a closer look, how radically different is her business model compared to those of many pharma firms? Medicines360 diversifies its income and is partly dependent on sales for its financial sustainability – ditto for other pharma firms. Her business focus is medicines for neglected conditions among people in developing countries. Traditional pharma firms have also made some significant strides in this direction through innovative prize funds.
So how different is Medicines360? Based on what was presented at the conference, not much. Is their model a radical departure from current models? Perhaps a comparison of their balance sheet with those of traditional pharma firms may help, but I suspect that very little would be different.
Be as it may, Medicines360 may be the first step in the direction of a conversation about business models that enable all patients when in need to access medicines.

Joao, from New Haven, CT