Question

Quintiles Transnational: Dennis Gillings founded Quntiles Transnational in 1982 when he realized that drug companies were great at inventing new medicines but not particularly good at analyzing the vast amounts of data that came out of clinical trials. He thought drug testing should be broken down into a series of standardized steps and he signed up a network of doctors interesting in enrolling patients in clinical trials. In the ten years leading up to 2010, Quintiles had conducted 4,700 trials on 2.7 million patients.

Quintiles also established a large contract sales organization (CSO) to support its pharmaceutical company clients. Large pharmaceutical companies, faced with cost pressures as well as the costs of maintaining their own sales forces, have increasingly turned to CSOs like the Innovex division of Quintiles, PDI Inc., or inVentive Health to provide variable cost “flex reps” as an alternative to adding the fixed cost they would incur if they added to their own sales forces. CSOs are widely used in therapeutic areas that require somewhat less scientific knowledge, like respiratory, dermatology, and lifestyle. The growth rate in contract sales and marketing was projected at 35% to 2015.

Question: Assume you are the CEO of a pharmaceutical company. Do you think you might use the CSO capabilities of Quintiles? Why or why not? 200 words or more

Answer 1

Yes, I might use the CSO capabilities of Quintiles if required because I feel that if an organization is unable to maintain the cost of their own sales force then it is better tot turn towards CSO because I believe that it is one of the most successful alternatives where costs are decreased, investments are efficient and the risks are reduced to quite some extent. The primary reason why organizations are moving towards CSO because they actually let the organizations to focus on their primary business capabilities and outsource these services.

The organizations can actually convert the fixed cost they incur into segments of variable cost like reducing costs, increasing sales and rapid access to the market. This has been more popular in the pharma industry because of the convenience the organization provides and various third party organizations have been involved in this way of the business and transformed the total way of doing business. I feel that it is ok to avail the services but it would be better if the organization itself plan to implement something of this sort themselves which will be even more better for the organization.