In Seeking Focus, Ipsen Turns To Specialty Pharma Model

Marc de Garidel, Ipsen's new CEO and a 15-year Amgen Inc. veteran, is re-focusing the mid-sized French group's attention on its core commercial assets, trimming the portfolio, and narrowing down early-stage R&D. The de-risking move turns Ipsen sharply in a specialty pharma direction that may please some investors over the near-term, but which raises questions related to the future viability of Ipsen's R&D engine. Ipsen had begun to lose its way after an initially-promising transformation began about a decade ago under the leadership of previous CEO and chairman Jean-Luc Bélingard. During the time period, Ipsen grew from a privately-owned, primary-care focused, domestic player to a listed biotech-product specialist with international ambition. With the transformation incomplete, most analysts welcomed de Garidel's arrival in December 2010, especially his knowledge of the US market, which Ipsen has largely failed to crack. "The old team was beginning to lose credibility," opines one analyst who did not want to be named. "Garidel knows the US, and he knows biopharma. He has a strategy," says this executive.

The new strategy is centered on prioritizing and fully leveraging two marketed products – Somatuline (lanreotide) for acromegaly and neuroendocrine...