Tag Archives: design

‘Design Thinking’: Translating Struggles into Positive Outcomes in Pharma

Posted on by
Reply

Problems of various nature will keep coming on business, as long as long as one remains in the business. It doesn’t spare anyone in the organization – from the very top to right up to the very bottom. All is susceptible to problems. Thus, underlying part of all jobs, is one’s ability to solve problems – decisively, as these keep coming.

At the corporate level, problems could be either self-created. For example, when each functional area operates in a silo, at times restricting overall corporate business growth. This may happen not only due to lack of operational synergy, but also for setting incompatible goals. Problems may even arise out of environmental hindrances, or for smarter competitive strategies. Both would adversely impact the company performance, including the possibility of damage to reputation, and at times, even survival of the business. At the individual level, problems at the work place, may affect one’s personal life, work life, career path, key performance areas or even income, among many others.

Looking at the positive aspect of it, as the saying goes, each problem comes as a hidden opportunity, which needs to be harvested. Importantly, in a work environment, the degree of career success of an individual is often associated with the person’s problem-solving ability – in innovative ways. Conversely, one pays a commensurate price for not being able to do so.

In any case, ‘problem solving’ skill is important for all, as much as it is in any business, irrespective of whether the environment around is digital or one involving with lesser of computer technology. This skill is highly necessary for business success. Therefore, the essence of garnering differential competitive edges in any business remains deeply embedded in the quality of problem-solving ability of its people, across various organization functions.

In a broader sense, any innovation – including drug innovation that falls at the high end of the pharmaceutical value chain, is also basically a problem-solving initiative. This encompasses even some of the serendipitous discoveries, such as Viagra for erectile dysfunction. In this article, I shall try to explore the wider applications of a robust process in problem solving – the application of ‘Design Thinking’ in pharma industry.

‘Design Thinking’:

The roots of ‘Design Thinking’ hail back to the mid-1950s with the introduction of the subject, Design Science, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), says US Collective in a paper titled, “What is Design Thinking and how can businesses benefit from it?”

According to MIT Sloan School of Management: “Design thinking is an innovative problem-solving process rooted in a set of skills.”This process has been successfully applied to developing new products and services. It begins with understanding the unmet needs of customers. And from that insight emerges a process for innovation, encompassing concept development, applied creativity, prototyping, and experimentation. With the application of ‘design thinking’ in business, the success rate for any innovation has been seen to improve substantially.

In its analysis, MIT Sloan found that design-driven companies such as Apple, Coca-Cola, IBM, Nike, Procter & Gamble, and Whirlpool have outperformed the S&P 500 over the past 10 years by an accumulated 211 percent in what’s called the Design Value Index—a portfolio of 16 publicly traded companies that integrate design thinking into corporate strategy. According to a 2016 report from the Design Management Institute, this marks the third consecutive year the index has shown an excess of 200% over the S&P 500.

‘Design Thinking’ in pharma:

As we have seen, ‘design thinking’ approach is a human-centric way of problem-solving, understanding the user needs. In the pharma space, it’s problem solving to address its stakeholders’, including patients’ needs and requirements related to health. Thus, for innovative drug marketing, as well, ‘design thinking’ could play a very useful role to make all organizational activities patient-centric – for greater all-round corporate success.

In this context, an article on ‘design thinking’, appeared in the Financial Times on October 12, 2017 reported: “Development of a drug can take around 15 years. But by using the design-thinking process, you could make clinical trials shorter by collecting more real-time data. The manufacturing process and design of packaging could be improved by a better understanding of how drugs are being used. And costs could be reduced, enabling the more expensive drugs to be made more available.”

Four steps of ‘Design Thinking’:

MIT Sloan outlined 4 simple steps in ‘design thinking’ process, which I am summarizing in pharma perspective, as follows:

1.Understand the problem – the source could be both internal or external:

As MIT Sloan professor Steve Eppinger said: “Most people don’t make much of an effort to explore the problem space before exploring the solution space.”

This often happens in pharma too. It’s not very uncommon that looking at just manifestations of problems, a company will look for a solution – quite akin to providing symptomatic relief in the treatment of a disease.

Eppinger further articulated, the mistake that problem solvers usually make ‘is to try and empathize, connecting the stated problem only to their own experiences.’ This falsely leads to the belief that problem solvers completely understand the situation. But the actual problem is always much broader, more nuanced, or quite different from what people originally assume, he underscored.

2. Workout possible solutions – involving those who matter 

3. Prototype these, test and further refine

4. Implement the best possible solution

Professor Eppinger further said, people at work can use ‘design thinking’ not only to design a new product or service, but anytime they’ve got a challenge – a problem to solve. Applying ‘design thinking’ techniques to business problems, pharma companies can offer greater value to customers, and stay relevant.

Pharma companies imbibing ‘design thinking’:

There are examples that some pharma companies are seriously nurturing the concept of ‘design thinking.’ One such an instance was captured in an interview, published in pharmaphorum on May 3, 2018. During this interaction, the head of innovationof the global pharma major – UCB,articulated how his company is creating a culture based around ‘design thinking’, right across the organization.

Acknowledging that pharma is generally accused of being distant from patients that it intends to serve, he explained how UCB is aiming to address this issue byfostering a new patient-centric organizational culture through ‘Design thinking.’

Detailed analysis of the needs of the target audience following this process, and the use of insights thus gained, will also encourage researchers to create appropriate new products. The core idea is to create products that are led by the needs of customers – something that is so critical for pharma companies, particularly in increasingly competitive commercial landscape.  He advised people to be persistent and professional, as they measure and see the results, which has potential to create a snowball effect in the organization.

Conclusion:

Several studies indicate that the companies with a long track record of delivering stakeholder value, are more customer focused. Apparently, pharma players are progressively experiencing that for sustainable business excellence, their customers – including patients, should form the nucleus of corporate business strategy. The same concept should, thereafter, cascade down while developing the game plan for each functional area. There doesn’t seem to be any other viable alternative for the same, right now.

With upswing volatility in the business environment, ‘design thinking’ merits to become a relentless process, particularly for creating assertive employee-mindset to accept the challenge of perpetual change, anytime. Accordingly, a well-structured and equally well-integrated, ongoing feedback data generation mechanism, together with sophisticated analytical tools, supported by other requisite resources, should be put in place.

Ample evidences demonstrate that ‘design thinking’ helps business to stay always in sync with the market, customers and also its employees, for performance excellence. It can provide creative inputs for developing game changing business strategies, meeting customers’ new expectations, or even to reformulate those, which are yielding declining or sub-par outputs. Consequently, it becomes incumbent upon top decision makers to integrate this process into the pharma organizational culture.

Thus, I believe, ‘design thinking’ is an effective way of creative problem solving in a number of situations, having its source both within and outside the organization. It carries a promise of improved all-round corporate achievement – often translatiaing struggles into positive outcomes in the pharma business.

By: Tapan J. Ray   

Disclaimer: The views/opinions expressed in this article are entirely my own, written in my individual and personal capacity. I do not represent any other person or organization for this opinion.

The Power Of Color And Design In Pharma Branding

Posted on by
Reply

On November 06, 2015, the District Court of Delaware of the United States (US) passed a temporary restraining order barring Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories (DRL) from selling in the US its generic version of AstraZeneca’s blockbuster anti-ulcerant drug Nexium, with immediate effect. 

This temporary order came in response to the petition moved by the drug innovator – AstraZeneca, objecting to the use of purple color in DRL’s generic equivalent of Nexium, launched in September 2015.

According to an estimate, this generic formulation could fetch a post tax profit of around US$25 to US$35 million to DRL in 2016. Nevertheless, the Delaware court order is pending a further hearing. The court has also asked both the companies to suggest the next course of action.

When color becomes an integral part of brand value creation: 

AstraZeneca’s effective branding of ‘purple color pills’ Nexium and Prilosec has helped the company to obtain this temporary restraining court order, which states: 

“As a result of such promotional efforts, there is undisputed evidence that the media and the public associate the color purple with AstraZeneca and its Prilosec and Nexium products.”      

The Court observed, though DRL product is not identical to AstraZeneca’s Nexium, still could confuse patients due to its association with the purple color.

In this context, it is worth noting, though a couple of other generic Nexium capsules are available in the US, none is purple in color. Teva’s capsules are green and blue and Mylan’s are white in color.

Can a right be established on branding ‘color’?

It appears so. In its Complaint to the Court against DRL, AstraZeneca (AZ) argued in favor of its successful branding of Nexium with ‘Purple Color, as follows:

  • AZ brand has offered relief to sufferers of severe heartburn and other disorders caused by stomach acid reflux through its “Purple Pills” Prilosec® and Nexium®, known as “The Purple Pill®.”
  • AZ has devoted significant resources over the years to advertise and promote its Prilosec® and Nexium® purple pills using the ‘look for’ purple advertising.                                                 
  • The preference for purple was purely for branding purposes—purple contributes nothing to the safety or efficacy of AZ’s products. 
  • AZ has continuously sold Nexium® from 2001 to present in purple colored capsules with either two or three gold-colored bands displayed on the purple capsules.
  • Thus, AZ’s Purple Pills have been famous for many years through extensive advertising both to doctors and patients and extensive publicity, among other reasons. 
  • If DRL is not enjoined from using the color purple, DRL’s purple generic pills are likely to cause confusion among consumers and others and are likely to dilute the distinctiveness of AZ’s federally registered purple color trademarks. 
  • DRL’s attempt to free-ride off the fame of AZ’s famous Purple Pills poses imminent irreparable harm to both AZ and the public if not enjoined.

I would like to remind the readers at this point that Pfizer also did branding of Viagra keeping the color of the pill as one of the key ingredients, as it is also well-known as the ‘Blue Pill’, across the world.

Does color of the pill matter to patients? 

In this regard, on July 15, 2014, an interesting study titled, “Burden of Changes in Pill Appearance for Patients Receiving Generic Cardiovascular Medications After Myocardial Infarction”, published in the journal of ‘Annals of Internal Medicine’, wanted to find out whether non persistent use of generic drugs among patients with cardiovascular disease after Myocardial Infarction (MI) is associated with the inconsistent appearance of their medications.

The study concluded, “Variation in the appearance of generic pills is associated with the nonpersistent use of these essential drugs after MI among patients with cardiovascular disease.”

Or in other words, the researchers found, 30 percent or more patients are likely to stop taking their medication because the unexpected change, can be confusing.

Impact of a branding strategy with color and design as integral parts: 

Even after a product goes off-patent, ‘Intellectual Property Rights (IPR)’ could still protect aspects of a pill design, which are not associated with product functioning.

The above study finds that in true sense, the shape and color of the tablets or capsules are very much intimately associated with the functional aspect of the product, as these characteristics established through effective branding exercise of the original product, help promoting patient compliance to various drugs, which is so important in combating serious ailments.

Effective branding with extrinsic factors: 

The above important research finding clearly establishes that even the extrinsic product features like, color and design, when used in an effective branding strategy, could have critical medical relevance for the patients.

Such clever pharma branding strategies are not just restricted to:

  • AstraZeneca’s “little purple pill” – Nexium
  • Or Pfizer’s “blue-diamond-shaped tablet” – Viagra.

There are many other examples of making extrinsic product features as effective branding tools. A few of these are as follows:

  • GlaxoSmithKline’s craftily designed a “tilt-tab” for its Parkinson’s disease brand Requip. This design makes it easier for the patients to pick up the tablets. Requip “tilt-tab” has been modeled with unconventional 5 sides and a pointed fulcrum that prevents it from lying flat.
  • Diovan blister packs of Novartis with calendar markings for pills, improved patient compliance significantly, as a research study established.
  • Special caps are now reportedly available that fit on most prescription drug bottles, containing a wireless chip that communicates with a light plug. The cap pulses orange light, when the patient forgets to take a pill.

An article published in the ‘Outsourcing-Pharma.com’ on March 11, 2014 states, Philadelphia based Colorcon, that works with many pharma manufacturers, both innovator and generic players, to shape and coat their tablets, has a library of 40,000 different colors and shapes of samples to choose from.

The color and design war in pharma branding has just begun: 

The importance of color and design as a pharma brand identity has started being realized today. The latest DRL case involving the color of AstraZeneca’s Nexium, close on the heels of similar other cases related to the blue color of Pfizer’s Viagra, has thrown open a critical question.

This query wants a specific answer, whether IP protection on Trademark would get extended to distinctive colors, which through branding initiatives have become strongly associated with a specific brand. Possibly the unprecedented lawsuit on the subject by AstraZeneca against DRL would ultimately settle the legal aspect of the issue, decisively.

Nevertheless, the importance of color and design as two key ingredients of successful pharma branding would remain unchallenged from ‘creative marketing’ stand point.

Conclusion:

There are market research studies that suggest that around 80 percent of visual information for any brand is related to color and design. Pharmaceuticals are no exceptions. Thus, these important extrinsic product features can be strategically leveraged with the intrinsic product benefits in a branding exercise, to create a cutting edge value synergy.

In today’s environment of innovative branding strategy, the state of art tablet color and design technologies may be appropriately utilized by the pharma players to successfully build and also to get limited brand protection, as happened in the case of Nexium of AstraZeneca.

The research findings, as mentioned above, that such type of branding has important medical relevance too, may be construed as an additional silver lining to this exciting process.

In my view, the aforesaid strategy would make enormous sense for branded generic drugs too, though with tailor-made approaches, which could well be a different discussion altogether.

Keeping all this in perspective, I reckon, innovative use of the power of color and design in pharma ‘branding’ exercise, including a comprehensive communication strategy with appropriate platforms, could provide an important leading edge for significant commercial success of a brand.

By: Tapan J. Ray 

Disclaimer: The views/opinions expressed in this article are entirely my own, written in my individual and personal capacity. I do not represent any other person or organization for this opinion.