Paulash Mohsen, Pfizer

Paulash Mohsen

Vice President, Primary Care Strategy, Pfizer

The Primary Care Business Unit at Pfizer has taken some major steps to respond to the needs of our customers. We've moved from our historic "top-down" approach to a model centered around listening to what our customers are saying. In our new model, local managers, who are much closer to the customer, are empowered to make many more decisions.

My role is anchored around development of the strategy for the global Primary Care BU, which accounts for approximately half of Pfizer's revenue. If strategy is deciding which levers to pull to achieve our long term vision, my job is to (a) help articulate those strategies on behalf of the BU, and (b) work across the BU to help drive major initiatives aligned with those strategies.

While product innovation remains critical—and in some specialty areas is still the overwhelming priority—there are other areas, notably primary care, where commercial innovation is becoming a differentiating factor. Going forward, I believe we'll see pharma companies getting more nuanced about the way they commercialize products.

The pressures facing our industry have been increasing dramatically for some time now. Given changes in demographics and governments' ability to finance healthcare obligations, we will likely soon be in a place where incremental change is no longer viable. Most pharma companies are at the stage of exploring change now. I predict that in 10 years some new pathways to success will become clear, and they'll look quite different from the pathway to success today.