Pharmaceutical Executive Daily: Nine European Drugmakers Note Concern Over Region's Pharma Investments

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In today's Pharmaceutical Executive Daily, nine of Europe's largest drugmakers warn EU leaders that the region risks losing pharmaceutical investment to the U.S. and China without urgent policy action, Novartis licenses a preclinical radioligand therapy asset from BoomRay Pharmaceuticals in a deal worth up to $900 million, and Rafaat Rahmani argues that the most expensive competitive intelligence failure is missing the exact moment a company's strategic assumption becomes wrong.

Nine of Europe's largest drugmakers, including AstraZeneca, GSK, and Novartis, warn that the region risks a "slow agony" of declining pharmaceutical investment unless the EU and its member states act. The companies' chairs point to Europe's R&D share falling from 43% in 1990 to 31% today, a commercial clinical trial share that has halved to 9% over the past decade, and 40% of new therapies that never reach European patients at all. They call on Brussels and national governments to speed up clinical trials, strengthen intellectual property protections, and add fiscal flexibility for health spending, warning that closing the investment gap with the U.S. and China could unlock $70 billion and 82,000 jobs.

Novartis has signed an exclusive global license agreement with BoomRay Pharmaceuticals for a preclinical radioligand therapy asset, in a deal worth up to $900 million including milestone payments and royalties on global net sales. The addition builds out Novartis's oncology pipeline in radioligand therapies, which pair targeting molecules with radioactive isotopes to deliver radiation directly to cancer cells, though Novartis has not disclosed the upfront payment or other deal terms beyond the $900 million total.

Finally, Rafaat Rahmani argues that the costliest competitive intelligence failure isn't a missing data point, but a missed moment: the point at which a company's foundational strategic assumption quietly becomes wrong. Writing as pharma companies enter competitive intelligence RFP season for 2027 budgets, Rahmani contends that the most valuable CI partner is the one willing to challenge a client's assumptions rather than simply supply more data. He points to AI-driven monitoring and a shrinking pool of external CI vendors as two forces reshaping the function, putting more pressure on internal CI leaders to do more with less.

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