Case Study of Cymbalta (Drug)

NAME - Airat Ajao

COURSE - AMBA 650 Section 1136

COURSE TITLE - Marketing Management and Innovation

Week 4

ASSIGNMENT – Case Analysis of Cymbalta

PROFESSOR - Michael E. Gleeson

CASE STUDY OF CYMBALTA’S DEVELOPMENT

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Cymbalta was launched into the pharmaceutical market as a successor to Prozac, one of the legendary antidepressant drugs in the 1990’s. Prozac had been effective for a long period of time but with less than three years for its patent license to expire by December 2003, the marketing and R & D team came together and formed (NAT) New Antidepressant Team in Lilly which was to aid them in the research for a new antidepressant drug to replace Prozac.

John Kaiser the marketing director of Lilly and other top members of the R & D and marketing departments were attending a meeting in which they were to deliberate and discuss on the expiration of Prozac their flagship commercial drug for depression and find another drug which would be as effective and satisfactory to both patients and physicians. Mr. Kaiser was a little concerned about how soon they would be able to get a successor to Prozac hoping to meet the dead line for the patent expiration in December. At the same time, they needed to be certain whatever drug going into the market after the success of Prozac had to meet expectations and be twice as effective as its predecessor.

Prozac was a leading drug in the antidepressant markets, a unique medication in the group of (SSRIs) selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors which generated more then $2 billion dollars annually, a standard Kaiser concluded would be hard for any other drug to match. Another concern for Kaiser was the fact that research and development on drugs before being approved by the FDA go through a series of tests, trials and inspections form one laboratory to the other which sometimes takes almost a decade before an approval to the market or not....