Layoffs are coming

I have a great idea...lets hire a "c list" celebrity like Sharon Osbourne to be our spokesperson. Then we can structure the contract so that we have to pay her a s**tload of money even if she is utterly unusable because she's a compliance nightmare! That's a swell idea. Oh...and lets make sure that the attorney who approved the language in that contract remains employed even after a big round of layoffs. Really...you just can't make this stuff up!

 

$9.99 Goal for the Stock before end of 2020!!!

 

Please don’t fire her. We need a lawyer who says yes to ideas at least some of the time. Even the stupid ideas.

 

I love the that when you come here to the Alkermes section of Cafepharma there are ads for Sublocade! That sort of says it all. In case you were wondering, this is what it feels like to be on the losing side.

 

Calling Sharon Osbourne a "c-list celebrity" is generous! The sad thing is, this isn't even among the top five horror stories that could be told about mismanagement, hush-money settlements with former employees, cult-like leadership, wildly inappropriate behavior, poor stewardship of resources, etc. in this place. The real question is why does the board of directors still drink the Papa Pops Kool-Aid?

 

Why does the board drink the Kool-Aid? Was that question supposed to be rhetorical? The answer is obvious. They have their heads planted so deeply in the trough that they don't want to do anything that will interrupt the constant supply of tasty slop that they gorge themselves on. As long as Pops takes care of them, they will protect him, even if its at the expense of the ordinary workers in the company, and even if its bad for our patients, our customers, and our stockholders.

 

The worst parts of that equation are the patients and the stockholders. There are so many more patients that could be benefiting from our products if this place wasn't so horribly mismanaged. Money wasted, needless positions (FRM's, KAM's, HBL's and the 10 billion MSL's we have that have nothing to do).

Stockholders are so in the dark about how mismanaged this place is because if they knew they's sell sell sell so fast your head would spin. I've worked for 5 other pharma's over my 31 years in this industry and this place used to be good and now it is the worst I've ever worked at.

 

Then leave and quit posting in every thread

 

‘Your first sentence is only half right. First, nobody gives 2 cents about patients, and second, it’s only the stockholders that matter. Don’t ever forget what I just told you.

 

I agree with this posting. The board members are in it for themselves and they will not even try to fix this place if it might interfere with their exorbitant compensation. That brings me back to the stockholders. There are five investment funds that collectively own more than 57% of this company. They are: Prime Cap, Wellington, T. Rowe Price, Vanguard, and Black Rock. If they understood the level of self-dealing, nest-feathering, and mismanagement in this place they would have the power to intervene and make a real change. The real question is how do we enlighten them and get them to intervene?

 

Mmmmm...."Papa Pops Kool-Aid"...its a delicious blend of self-delusion and group-think that leaves you happy to be losing money in the market. Look for it anywhere snake oil is sold!

 

Well, thank god Papa Pops Kool-Aid doesn't require FDA approval or we'd never get that on the market either!

 

Hey now, be nice to Papa Pops! He's not a bad guy, just way out of his depth. It's a classic case of "Founder's Syndrome". Even Ben and Jerry are no longer in charge at Ben and Jerry's.

 

arrogance and delusion worked really well with FDA last time. Plenty of feedback along the way from FDA and investigators that the studies were flawed. But did we listen? Nope. We are smarter than the FDA. Result was no approval. Same will hold true for olanzipine/Sami combo. So much promise, so much pumping on Mad Money but it was all smoke and mirrors. Company is in critical condition. Perhaps a little lipstick will attract a desperate buyer. Peace out Pops

 

Buckle Up!

 

Here is a thought about the above posting. Anonymous email addresses are easy to create. Why not bypass the board, and even this blog, and write directly to Prime Cap, Wellington, T. Rowe Price, Vanguard, & Black Rock? They all have websites with a "contact us" section. Even better, with a bit of effort you can probably find email addresses for the CEOs and/or fund managers. Tell them you are a company employee and share with them a litany of the waste, mismanagement, and scandal associated with this place. The more of us who do this the better. Then watch the real fun begin! If the organizations that own over half of this company (and who have lost hundreds of millions) start to insist on some changes, then we will see real reform in this nest of self-congratulatory bumblers. Let's not just talk to one another inside this echo chamber, but instead talk to the people who have the power to make a real change.

 

Better yet, why not look for a new job?
Don’t waste your time and energy on trying to change a company that doesn’t want to change.

 

On an individual selfish level, of course it would be easier to just find a new job. But there is a real tragedy here and I'd like to at least try and do something about it. We have a wonderful product in Vivitrol, and yet a tiny percentage of the people who could benefit from it are getting it. Who do we blame for that? We blame everyone but ourselves.

We blame the competition. We blame the existing treatment providers. We blame the harm reduction community. We blame the federal and state governments. We blame the patients. We blame the addiction doctors. We blame the media.

Could it be instead that we have an unfocused and dogmatic message we are trying to promote? Could it be that we have tolerated and even promoted a fulfillment system which is so difficult and time consuming that it discourages patients and practitioners from using our products? Could it be that we defend this fulfillment system because it keeps lots of high paid staff within the company employed? Could it be that when people inside the company point these things out they are viewed as trouble makers and disloyal? Could it be that we deliberately antagonize the existing treatment community by constantly sending the message that therapy with any medication but our own is not recovery? This message was delivered by Pops himself at the White House, and is repeated implicitly and explicitly at all levels in the company.

This blaming of others, self-righteousness, and refusal to change, is what leaves us stuck in the low single digits of the marketplace. No fundamental change of direction is possible with the existing cast of characters at the top of the company. We need a new broom to sweep clean. If it were just the demise of Alkermes at stake here I would say "no big deal". Corporate failure is just part of the creative destruction of capitalism. Unfortunately, in the mean time, a medicine that could save lives is being underutilized because we can't get out of our own way to fix what is broken.

Prime Cap, Wellington, T.Rowe Price, Vanguard, Black Rock...please come save us!

 

It's really sad that the guy in charge of the 5461 submission Damien has taken over all of JB's duties so he is now running the show for all our products. That's the REALLY SCARY thing.