Annual Program Guiding Effective Competitive Response Planning

The client

A top 10 global pharmaceutical company with a large specialty care business unit with a significant presence in immunology.

Business challenge 

After several years as the only biologic in market, the client faced a significant competitive challenge and wanted a robust program that would allow them to identify and address specific competitive threats.

Our approach

We developed a program to ensure learnings from competitor launches were effectively shared with affiliates to support local competitive planning:

• Monthly action planning meetings to promote an ongoing competitive intelligence dialogue between global teams and key affiliates
• A monthly report that summarizes the latest competitive dynamics and underlying drivers
• Competitor calls/video newscasts to share global insights from competitor launches, as well as country best practices
• Global competitor response workshop:
  • Timed to fall immediately after the major conference for the therapy area
  • Cross-functional team with representatives from global and key affiliates test current assumptions, hypothesize the competitor strategy, and build their counter-strategy, tactics, and key messages

Valued outcome

• A robust program that allowed the client to anticipate competitive challenges and maintain a leadership position despite the launch of novel therapy classes
  • We identified key changes to competitor messaging that allowed the client to develop an objection handler to specifically address the topics of MoA, safety, and dosing
  • We used wargaming to identify fragmentation of the patient pool as a key competitive issue and co-developed tactics and counter-messaging to mitigate this threat
• A close working relationship with both global and affiliate teams to identify insights, pressure test ideas, and develop solutions whilst ensuring continued engagement and buy-in