How Big Pharma stumbled in its quest for blockbusters
If Sam Waksal had only kept faith in Erbitux, the targeted cancer drug made by his company ImClone, he would be free today. Instead, he is in jail for having sold ImClone stock on inside information that the Food and Drugs Administration had refused to consider Erbitux's application for approval.
Mr Waksal and Martha Stewart, his friend, should have waited. In the end, it proved just another glitch in the protracted clinical trials that any new drug has to endure. Now, Erbitux has been approved after all, and ImClone's stock has rebounded. Other biotechnology companies must envy it: not many drugs make it through the 15-year pipeline to market.
His loss of faith speaks to the current mood in pharmaceuticals. The $58bn hostile bid by Sanofi-Synth
