Patient Power

Millennium’s Isabelle Mercier tells NGP about the rising power of patient influence and marketing’s delivery of information demand.

“Patients have become much more assertive in finding information about their disease and their treatment options”
-Isabelle Mercier

As we continue stumbling through times of uncertainty and despondency, the call for transparency and accountability has been heightened throughout society, from senators who don't pay their taxes, to over-the-top executive bonuses. The same is true for the coordination of marketing in the pharmaceutical industry, as the power of patient desire for information is determining the way in which pharmaceutical companies operate.

"Patients have become much more aware of and assertive in finding information about their disease and their treatment options," says Isabelle Mercier, VP of Marketing at Millennium. "What's changing, from a marketing perspective, is the way in which we provide additional information and insights to the patients, allowing them to become more informed and educated about their treatment options.

"From a marketing perspective, we have to be prepared to engage them differently: traditionally it's been more the healthcare team being the conduit of information to the patient, but increasingly you hear of the patient coming in with printouts from the internet, with information they heard on the radio or saw on TV, demanding more from their healthcare team. We as a pharmaceutical company have an opportunity to play a role in educating patients, which is probably the most striking change in the pharmaceutical marketing."

More responsibility

Pharmaceutical companies are now facing the responsibility of providing patients with treatment information and must take on a more informative role than they have previously. "The most relevant trend is that of demand for full disclosure of information, which is becoming more stringent. That full disclosure is an opportunity for the pharmaceutical company to enhance the understanding of the treatment options and/or the particular therapeutic option that the pharmaceutical company has to offer," says Mercier. A greater role of responsibility, if seized upon with an opportunistic approach, can allow for pharmaceutical companies to approach healthcare with an element of creativity as it provides more valuable and insightful information.

In her new role as Vice President of Marketing, Mercier will be leading and developing the US and global marketing strategy for the commercialization of late phase development products, along with oncology market products. "Millennium is specific to oncology and has a vision of developing and delivering first class therapeutic agents, aiming to offer more patients across the globe new innovative therapeutic agents to advance cancer care.

"When you look at the portfolio of pipeline agents, the late phase products, as well as currently marketed products, are either best or first in class, which speaks volumes to the engagement that Millennium has. This is done from a scientific perspective of understanding the specific mechanisms that lead to cancer genesis and targeting the ones that are the most relevant to counter that cancer development, providing that option to offer more patients treatment across the world." It is global visions such as this that provide the company with its methods for branding.

Millennium's approach to branding is very different to that of other pharmaceutical companies. As their entire focus is cancer care, the link between the product and the company vision is inherent. "Due to the fact that we are solely focused on cancer care and interested in serving the patient with high level science therapeutic options, that potential conflict between corporate branding and actual therapeutic agents is not an issue here at Millennium, which it makes it a unique organization from that perspective," says Mercier.

"If you think of the larger pharmaceutical companies, the struggle they always find themselves facing is due to them not focusing on a single therapeutic area: on a single disease, or disease state. Since every cancer is different from each other, they do face an identity barrier between the therapeutic options they offer and their organization as a whole. As a specific oncology company, Millennium is a therapeutic agent entirely dedicated to advancing cancer care, and therefore we avoid that identity barrier."

Strategic decisions

As a company that has demonstrated how to successfully build a corporate brand, Mercier advises that it is the strategic decisions the company has made that allowed them to successfully project a specific image. "Branding is a question of what the company wants to be known for. We want to be known for having the ability to take high-level science and transform it into therapeutic options for patients, and we have already demonstrated this through currently marketed products, such as the delivery of Velcade. So the concept of bringing science from the bench to the clinic is something that's very familiar to us.

"Other organizations tend to identify themselves more as pharmaceutical companies and do not necessarily have that sort of predefined identify of being a pharmaceutical company that is known for its science. We have transitioned already from that perspective because we are focusing on cancer care and stated this by naming ourselves as Millennium, the Takeda Oncology Company," says Mercier.

As Mercier explains, the development of marketing strategies is not about to change in a dramatic way, both for the industry and Millennium itself. "Understanding to a greater extent your customers, understanding their needs, their wish lists, and designing and assessing how you can address those needs and wishes is what is subject to change.

Specialized approach

"What will evolve is the development of personalized medicine, especially in cancer care. It's a significant trend, so from a pharmaceutical company perspective our need is to be laser-focused on the disease, on the customer and on the patient, and the positioning of a brand will need to be there to address those needs. We're going to take even more of a specialized, customized approach, just like medicine is evolving in that direction.

"A specialized approach is going to involve targeting specific diseases with specific characteristics, avoiding the over-treating of patients that probably would not benefit from the therapy, and instead providing maximum benefit with balancing the risk associated with any therapeutication for a better defined group of patients and/or diseases that your therapy might be best suited for."

Such marketing techniques of specialized products and focusing on the development of personalized medicines have certainly benefited Millennium's branding, as it continues to align its strategies on cancer care. "This is a tremendous opportunity for Millennium to be part of the transforming of cancer care into a chronic disease. The evolution of cancer survivals have made great strides in the past ten years; there's a lot more to be done and certainly we are very much engaged in being part of making that happen and serving the patients."

Millennium history
Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Inc., was established in 1993 as a genomics company applying world-class recombinant technology to the discovery and development of innovative new therapies in a broad spectrum of diseases

Millennium has since grown into a fully integrated biopharmaceutical company with a pipeline of investigational drug candidates, as well as a commercialized medicine derived from Nobel Prize-winning science that is now approved in more than 87 countries worldwide.

In May of 2005, the company's leadership changed as Founder Mark Levin turned the helm over to Deborah Dunsire. For the next several years, significant refocusing and reconfiguration took place within the company, as well as improvements in the scale and strength of its commercial operations.

In May 2008, Millennium was acquired by Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited. Takeda is the largest pharmaceutical company in Japan, and a global enterprise with an important presence in key markets.

Millennium now operates as an independent subsidiary, serving as the global center of excellence in oncology under its new name: Millennium: The Takeda Oncology Company.