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In 2011, we were experiencing the ascension of technologies like the cloud and the smartphone.  Apps had become a thing: social network apps like Instagram (the iPhone “App of the Year” in 2011) and Twitter, utility apps like Evernote and Dropbox, navigation apps like Google Maps and Waze, and game apps like Angry Birds. Yet in medicine, as I wrote... Read More

Two weeks ago, I wrote about how difficult it is for R&D leaders to “pick winners,” despite the enormous incentives to do so.  I explained how we tend to underestimate the role of chance, and overestimate our ability to “domesticate uncertainty,” as Nassim Taleb and I wrote in the Financial Times in 2008.  Mostly, efforts to systematically improve success rates... Read More

Everybody reading this column knows that biopharma is a difficult business.  Biology is unfathomably complicated and figuring out how to introduce something into the human body that does more good than harm is a fiendishly difficult challenge. That’s why it’s important to recognize the occasional success. It reminds us what’s possible, and inspires us to think about how to achieve... Read More

Peter Thiel, the contrarian investor, had a favorite question for interviewees: “What important truth do few people agree with you on?” My answer: No one can pick winners in pharma R&D.  When I think of the most significant blockbusters in the industry involving novel mechanisms of action (follow-ons are a different story), I see a huge amount of luck on... Read More