For Portfolio Strategy teams in pharma companies, there is a constant juggling act to ensure that the right therapies are being prioritized for the right indications. This requires a clear understanding of the potential market size, payer perspectives and competitive environment. With the right data and insight, you can plan your go-to-market approach – and in many cases, that means deciding whether or not your goal is to be first to market.
Historically, being first to market has been thought to confer significant advantage, and companies have raced to achieve that status. Some of the potential benefits seem fairly obvious: maximal unmet need and no competition are not to be sniffed at. And once you’ve achieved that status, there are additional advantages over competitors, such as the switching hesitancy from both patients and physicians that later arrivals may face. In short, if first to market is even remotely feasible, it should be prioritised as a goal.
Or should it?
Evaluate’s consulting team has undertaken analysis that suggests that striving to be first to market may not provide so certain an advantage as is often thought. We’ve investigated 180 launches across 85 indications over a 20-year period, and the data suggests that first-to-market programs do not have a reliable market share advantage.
This is the topic of our upcoming webinar in which my Evaluate Consulting colleagues, Tiffany Chan, Duncan Sweeney, and I will discuss the data and our findings. It’s a fascinating piece of analysis, and we’ll share some of the methodologies behind it to provide context. There is an interesting difference between therapy areas that we’ll dig into, as well as differences based on the number and speed of subsequent market entrants.
Why does this matter? For Portfolio Strategy teams, it’s vital to understand how to prioritize the novel drugs in your pipeline and how much weight you should give a first-to-market opportunity. When you’re entering a new market, there’s no market share or historical data to draw upon in your forecasting, so you need rigorous forecasting methodologies to make the right calls at the right time.
Both commercially and analytically, this will be a really interesting discussion and there is a lot to cover in the webinar. If you have a portfolio to juggle, please do join us at 3pm BST/10am ET for The First-to-Market Myth: What Really Drives Launch Success?
I hope to see you there!
