Drug industry CEOs must operate differently than the leaders of other businesses due to the role of medicines and ethics around medicine, said Merck & Co., Inc.’s outgoing executive chairman and former CEO Ken Frazier in a 16 November interview just two weeks ahead of his retirement from the pharmaceutical company.
“My personal view is that pharma CEOs can’t simply take the attitude that they are going to maximize financial outcomes, they’re going to maximize shareholders outcomes,” Frazier said at the 2022 STAT Summit. “I think we obviously have that obligation to our shareholders to make sure that they get a reasonable return on their invested capital