Leading for Innovation: And Organizing for Results

20.3. Our Approach to Innovation Management in Research

To optimally exploit the opportunities in pharmaceutical research, we are focusing on

• Prioritization of targets. The exponential increase in the number and types of potential drug targets makes it necessary to select targets according to disease priorities and drugability (that is, the ease of finding druglike molecules).

• Speed and productivity. In order to achieve optimal speed, our drug discovery processes must be multi-parallel and based on a "drug discovery engine" with large-scale capabilities. Furthermore we need to instill a culture that encourages discarding failing targets quickly and picking new ones. All of this will contribute to enhancing the productivity of our R&D activities ...