Pfizer will close R&D sites and cut jobs

[OhioChick]

Source: Reuters

Mon Nov 9, 2009 7:53pm EST

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Pfizer Inc (PFE.N), the world's biggest drugmaker, will close six research and development sites and trim jobs in the Unites States and the United Kingdom, following the acquisition of Wyeth.

The company on Monday said it will reduce its global research and development square footage by 35 percent.

Pfizer will discontinue R&D operations in Princeton, New Jersey; Chazy, Rouses Point and Plattsburgh, New York; Sanford and Research Triangle Park, North Carolina; and Gosport, Slough/Taplow, United Kingdom.

"While these changes are expected to bolster productivity and reduce costs, they will result in staff reductions," Pfizer said in a statement.

Pfizer will now conduct R&D at five main sites and nine specialized units around the world, as compared with 20 sites upon closing the acquisition of Wyeth.

The company did not elaborate on the number of jobs that will be cut. A spokeswoman could not be immediately reached for comment.



Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/ousivMolt/idUSTRE5A905K20091110

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More jobs cuts....

[FrenchieCat]

1. who would want to work for big pharma other than corporate sell outs

and people we don't like? :shrug:


:sarcasm:

[pundaint]

17. A short list.

People who would like to cure diseases.

People who need money to live, and don't like guns

Scientists who require a very big chemistry set to ply their trade.

And a few very greedy executives who farm out some of the really sleazy work to contractors in Washington DC on Constitution Ave, K Street, and, disappointingly, Pennsylvania Ave.

Ok, so you were partially correct.

[marmar]

2. Circling the drain.......

nt

[Mind_your_head]

3. And US GDP will SOAR......even though NOTHING is made here anymore

Yet it gets 'credited' to US GDP. There is no US of A anymore.

It's dead, Jim.

[napi21]

4. Bet your tootsies the Pubs use this as proof that new HC bill

is causing job loss & reduced great HC for Americans 'cause they're moving their R&D overseas! Of course there will be no mention of the acquisition!

[glinda]

11. they are working in tandem and boosting their profits. most drugs are not even made here....

[Juche]

5. I am sooooooo fucked

I already lost my job, but my degree is in a scientific field where most people either end up working in quality control or R&D. However with manufacturing disappearing so is quality control. And R&D might start getting outsourced en masse to India and China soon.

Ah well. I can always sell ribbon with my daddy.

[Paulie]

6. A smaller U.S footprint will probably mean less fines for their criminal activity

see: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=a4yV1nYxCGoA&pos=10

Pfizer Broke the Law by Promoting Drugs for Unapproved Uses
By David Evans


Nov. 9 (Bloomberg) -- Prosecutor Michael Loucks remembers clearly when lawyers for Pfizer Inc., the world’s largest drug company, looked across the table and promised it wouldn’t break the law again.

It was January 2004, and the attorneys were negotiating in a conference room on the ninth floor of the federal courthouse in Boston, where Loucks was head of the health-care fraud unit of the U.S. Attorney’s Office. One of Pfizer’s units had been pushing doctors to prescribe an epilepsy drug called Neurontin for uses the Food and Drug Administration had never approved.

In the agreement the lawyers eventually hammered out, the Pfizer unit, Warner-Lambert, pleaded guilty to two felony counts of marketing a drug for unapproved uses.

New York-based Pfizer agreed to pay $430 million in criminal fines and civil penalties, and the company’s lawyers assured Loucks and three other prosecutors that Pfizer and its units would stop promoting drugs for unauthorized purposes.

What Loucks, who’s now acting U.S. attorney in Boston, didn’t know until years later was that Pfizer managers were breaking that pledge not to practice so-called off-label marketing even before the ink was dry on their plea.

On the morning of Sept. 2, 2009, another Pfizer unit, Pharmacia & Upjohn, agreed to plead guilty to the same crime. This time, Pfizer executives had been instructing more than 100 salespeople to promote Bextra, a drug approved only for the relief of arthritis and menstrual discomfort, for treatment of acute pains of all kinds.

Record High Fine

For this new felony, Pfizer paid the largest criminal fine in U.S. history: $1.19 billion. On the same day, it paid $1 billion to settle civil cases involving the off-label promotion of Bextra and three other drugs with the U.S. and 49 states.

[w4rma]

7. Large mergers are usually bad for everyone. This results in less research. (nt)

[Psephos]

8. Should make pharma haters happy, right?

Or maybe not.

Some people aren't happy unless they're not happy. ;)

[Alcibiades]

9. I suppose this means less research

into re-engineering Viagra so that they can make more megabucks from it.

[glinda]

12. means less generics also so prices will be higher

[FarCenter]

10. 400 jobs at Princeton

[EFerrari]

15. Are most or many of these jobs at universities?

[FarCenter]

22. Princeton, NJ is a municipality

Pfizer has an R&D lab there.

Not at Princeton University.

This was a Wyeth R&D lab, and after the merger it is being closed because Pfizer has a larger lab doing similar work in the UK.

[EFerrari]

23. That's right. I remember all the labs in NJ now. n/t

[Double T]

13. Yep. Sure looks like the economic recession is just about over,..........

soon to be followed by a horrendous economic depression. The North Country of Upstate New York will be devastated by this move.

[tomm2thumbs]

14. and yet an endless stream of black suits pulling bags full of free food & samples

who hasn't seen that sort of thing in your doctor's office and just not wanted to puke

[excess_3]

16. joyous news... drug companies are thieves

[Demeter]

18. This is What Pfizer Does--Buys the Competition and Guts It

Why they haven't been prosecuted under Monopoly Laws is because, well, the Monopoly busting laws have been ignored for the duration.

[excess_3]

19. thats better than gutting their customers ..nt

[Demeter]

20. Gutting the Customer Is Step 2

and yes, they do it very deftly. Lots of practice.

[excess_3]

21. agree entirely .nt