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  • FROM THE ANALYST'S COUCH

Developing blockbuster drugs: both nature and nurture

  1. Lotte Berghauser Pont

    1. McKinsey & Co., Amsterdam, Netherlands.

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  2. Jiri Keirsse

    1. McKinsey & Co., Brussels, Belgium.

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  3. Rachel Moss

    1. McKinsey & Co., London, UK.

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  4. Pawel Poda

    1. McKinsey & Co., Poznan, Poland.

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  5. Lucas Robke

    1. McKinsey & Co., Dusseldorf, Germany.

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  6. Stephan Wurzer

    1. McKinsey & Co., Munich, Germany.

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Bringing blockbuster drugs that address significant medical needs to market is still considered the hallmark of productive, innovative R&D. In 2018, 56% of all prescription drug sales of the top 20 pharmaceutical companies came from blockbusters, based on data from Evaluate Pharma (see Related links). This trend is set to continue, with forecasts that ~10% of total drug sales in 2024 will be from the top 10 ‘mega blockbusters’, which have peak-year sales greater than US$5 billion.

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Nature Reviews Drug Discovery 20, 421-422 (2021)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41573-020-00061-9

Supplementary Information

  1. Supplementary information

Competing Interests

All authors of this article are employees of McKinsey & Company, a management consultancy firm that works with the world’s leading biopharmaceutical companies on innovation topics. The analysis in this study was funded by McKinsey's Pharmaceuticals and Medical Products practice and undertaken independently of any other organizations.

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