The commercial contribution of clinical studies for pharmaceutical drugs

Pharmaceutical drugs are rigorously evaluated through clinical studies. The commercial consequences of such clinical studies, both to the promotion for and sales of drugs, are largely under-researched. The present study answers the following research questions: 1) How does the evolution of clinical study outcomes affect product sales? 2) How does the evolution of clinical study outcomes affect a firm's promotion expenditures to physicians and consumers? 3) Is the assessment of the responsiveness of sales to promotion expenditures biased when the analyst omits the role of clinical studies? We summarize a comprehensive body of clinical studies in three metrics: valence, dispersion, and volume. We extend the literature with the following findings. A higher valence and volume of clinical studies (i.e., more positive and larger number of studies) increase sales. A higher valence of clinical studies increases spending on both direct-to-consumer advertising and direct-to-physician promotion. A higher dispersion among clinical studies decreases spending on direct-to-consumer advertising. A higher volume of clinical studies has no effect on direct-to-physician promotion, but decreases direct-to-consumer advertising. Furthermore, the results show that omitting these metrics from a market response model leads to an overestimation of the responsiveness of sales to promotion expenditures.     

Technological change and forms of innovation in consumer magazine publishing: a UK-based study

This paper presents the results of research undertaken between 2002 and 2004 into the impact of technological change on the UK consumer magazine industry. The findings highlight patterns of innovation, both in the range of products (most notably monthly magazine titles) and the structure of organisations and work practices, which have tended to elude much of the contemporary debate within the ‘cultural industries’ approach adopted in the media studies discipline. Instead, our analysis makes use of insights from the innovation literature to highlight the impact of technological discontinuities on the capabilities of both incumbent firms and new entrants. It also highlights the important and growing role that is being played in innovation-led industries through the adoption of organisational practices that find their origins in the traditions of project-based firms.