At this year’s FT Live Global Pharma and Biotech Summit, Takeda’s President and CEO Christophe Weber spoke about the increased challenges for healthcare systems. Weber acknowledged that as cost pressures increase, innovators like Takeda will need to make difficult choices to optimize their investments. He also identified the Japanese pharma’s efforts to increase productivity at a time when it is undergoing a major restructuring.

 

Under Pressure

Weber participated in the keynote interview “Innovation under pressure – How can industry be a trusted partner in healthcare transformation?” covering the increased challenges for healthcare systems in light of ageing populations and exponential advances in innovation. “Increased healthy life expectancy requires funding,” he said, recognizing that “since there is pressure, they [healthcare systems] are looking [more closely] at what should be reimbursed or not.”

Commenting on recent policies aimed at reducing costs for the government and patients, such as the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) in the US, Weber asserted, “The overall trend is that the economic life of new medicines is shorter, either through shorter exclusivity, or pricing,” something, he acknowledged as a pressure on innovators like Takeda. “The shorter the economic life of medicines; the more stringent we need to be.”

For Weber, this economic rigour translates into choosing R&D investments very carefully. “We invest about 6 billion dollars in R&D and the science is so rich we need to carefully select which molecules we develop.” The CEO was quick to point out that patients may be the losers when it comes to these difficult choices. “It is important for the world to continue rewarding innovation. The risk for society is lower R&D investment and fewer medicines that will reach patients.”

 

Reorganization

Takeda has recently felt the pressure of lost exclusivity directly when its Vyvanse therapy went off patent and as a result the company’s operating profit took a 56.4 percent plunge during the last fiscal year. Consequently, the Tokyo-based firm has embarked on a sweeping USD 899 million reorganization plan to “drive efficiencies” and improve core operating profit margin.

As a part of the plan, the pharma said it would “focus on agility and organizational simplicity, reducing layers, broadening spans, and refining operating models,” and has laid off large numbers of employees at it Massachusetts site in the US and shut down its plant in Orth, Austria.

 

Improving productivity

Weber also highlighted the importance of increasing productivity, something Takeda incorporated in its restructuring plan, including the use of digital, automation and artificial intelligence (AI) to optimize its processes. “At Takeda AI is really making a difference, along with a combination of technologies that is transforming the way we work,” Weber asserted. “We are seeing enormous productivity gains; across our entire value chain it is transforming how we operate.”

When it comes to manufacturing, Weber claimed the company could double its productivity with the use of new technologies and this increased manufacturing horse power, as the CEO noted, is needed for Takeda’s dengue vaccine QDENGA. “At the moment we are extending our manufacturing capacity because we cannot meet the demand.”

To ramp up production, Takeda partnered with Indian vaccine maker Biological E. Limited earlier this year. Aimed at increasing manufacturing capacity of up to 50 million doses a year, and to 100 million doses a year within a decade, the accord builds on the company’s existing manufacturing capacity for the vaccine at its facility in Singen, Germany through its long-term partnership with IDT Biologika GmbH.

To date, Takeda has launched QDENGA in private markets and some public programmes, and at the time of the partnership the president of the Global Vaccine Business Unit Gary Dubin said the company was “working with partners to support a broader public health impact.”  Weber indicated that the incidence of dengue has grown in endemic regions. “In the 10 years it took to develop the vaccine, dengue prevalence has increased.”

 

Image Source: Takeda Pharmaceuticals