Notes from the East
Woods
musings on opportunities in the life science
marketplace
May 2009
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Greetings!
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Rather than going it alone, try some mutualism to speed up your company. Please have a read and feel free to let me know what you think. Thanks.
Regards,
Paul Danis
Founder and Principal
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Mutualism, Pollination and Growth
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With spring finally showing itself here, the forest is alive
with bugs, birds, flowers, and animals.
Though I often take it for granted, some of the most amazing things are
the relationships they have with each other.
They are predator-prey, competitors, or for lack of a better word -
cooperators. This last category has lots of feel-good stories such
as pollination, fungal generation of nutrients, and seed dispersal. With cooperation both
parties derive benefits from this relationship that biologists call mutualism.
In a similar vein, I was at a tradeshow in Boston this week, and I was struck at how the
various vendors' products and services were so complementary to each
other. Granted there were the furtive
glances as competitors assessed the activity across the aisle, but overall most
companies seemed to be covering different segments of the market. There was almost a sense of camaraderie as they
pitched their wares. Maybe it was the
low level of funded prospects, but it was a fairly civil affair.
After chatting with many of the vendors, I could see that
there were numerous opportunities for mutually beneficial cooperation between
them. It seemed obvious to me that the
fellow with the fast data transfer would benefit from cooperation with the
cloud storage folks since both deal in large data sets. Similarly, the image sharing people could
leverage the cloud storage system as well as the fast file transfer. And all the analytical offerings could take
advantage of the infrastructure products.
The bottom line is that they are all attacking different pieces of the
same or related problems.
So why don't they shake hands, cooperate on providing solutions
to customers, and all benefit from this clear mutualism? There are several reasons why this doesn't happen,
some intentional, and some by ignorance.
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Ego - I often see smart people
deciding they can build the widget themselves even though the company in the
next aisle could readily supply it tomorrow.
Sure it's nice to own it all, but getting to market months sooner should
trump this.
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Lack of awareness - Frequently the folks
running these companies are at full capacity just keeping the train on the
track. They don't see these opportunities
since they are only staring through the windshield and not gazing around them.
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Not enough people - Often companies see
how partnering with Joe's Automation Company would shorten their time to
market, but they just don't have the people to build the relationship, manage
the process, and capitalize on the additional opportunities.
So what can they do to take advantgage of these new avenues
to grow their companies? The first step
would be swallow some pride and deflate some ego. Acknowledge that they can actually grow through
partnerships and cooperation, not only by constructing new products and
services themselves. Secondly this
"strategic intent" needs to be clearly stated to all the people in the company,
not just implied that it would be nice to do.
With this as a goal, everyone in the company can then filter what they
see in terms of how it could help them and how it fits with their own products
and services. All these eyes and ears
would flush out the possible partners for cooperation.
Finally cooperation needs people to make it happen. Planting seeds only yields a harvest when the
fields are tended. With the current
employment situation, there is a lot of talent on the sidelines waiting to run with the ball. Outside help can fill the
gap until the new sales fuel the addition of more people to the organization.
So try some mutualism.
Partnering with the people across the aisle can be quite beneficial to
both of you. All you have to lose is an
empty pipeline and long development cycles.
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Life Science Market Update
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Index
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April Value
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Change YTD
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Yearly High
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Yearly Low
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EC BioTools
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502
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13%
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502
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411
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EC BigPharma
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649
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-12%
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709
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617
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EC Biotech
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442
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-10%
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487
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431
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The Tools sector has shown wonderful resiliency in gaining 11% over last month, while its comrades in Pharma and Biotech are off 4% and 5%, resp., from last month. For tools companies, advances led declines 4 to 1, while in Pharma and Biotech declines led 7 to 1 and 2 to 1, resp.
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Many of the life science
indices currently available are a mixture of various types of companies. In
order to better assess the situation in the different segments, Eastwoods
Consulting has created these price-weighted indices for the sectors of large
pharmaceutical companies, biotech companies, and life science research tools
companies.
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EC BioTools Index - A, ACCL, AFFX, BEC, BIO, BRKR,
CALP, DNEX, HBIO, HLCS, ILMN, LIFE, LMNX, PKI, QGEN, SIAL,
TMO, VARI, WAT
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EC BigPharma Index - JNJ, PFE, GSK, NVS, SNY, MRK, ABT,
LLY, AZN, WYE, BMY, NVO, BAX, TEVA, SGP, ROG.VX
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EB Biotech Index - AMGN, GENZ, BIIB, CEPH, GILD,
BMRN, AMLN, IDXX, SEPR, OSIP, PDLI, CPHD, ALKS, REGN, MEDX, THRX, HGSI, SGMO, NKTR
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Prices are
taken at the close of each month.
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| About Eastwoods Consulting
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Eastwoods Consulting helps companies connect their technologies and products with the life science marketplace. By focusing on the most valuable opportunities, efficiency is increased, and profits grow.
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Copyright © 2009, Eastwoods Consulting. This
publication may be freely redistributed in full or in part as long as full
attribution including our contact information and web address, are included. Eastwoods is a registered servicemark of Eastwoods Consultng.
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