Twenty-five years ago I participated in an intense series of meetings in New York with a group of Japanese pharmaceutical executives and one Japanese government official. We were planning the launch of a new industry organization, which we named New York Pharma Forum.
The Japanese government official, Shiro Yamasaki, had been sent to New York by the Japanese Ministry of Health & Welfare, and it was his idea to start the new organization. The pharma industry participants at the meetings were presidents of the U.S. subsidiaries of Daiichi, Eisai, Sankyo, Takeda, Tanabe and Yamanouchi. (Notice that only two of the group of six companies still retains its name – all the rest merged with other large Japanese pharma companies, something most of the participants in those meetings would not have predicted.) We started by defining the organization’s mission and goals and then we brainstormed about every aspect of the new organization, from how it should be structured, to what the membership rules should be, to how much the dues would be and how often the organization would meet.
Before the mid-1980s, there were very few Japanese pharma companies in the U.S. The Japanese industry had a wide open playing field at home. There weren’t many foreign pharma companies in Japan, and those that were there had joint ventures with Japanese pharma partners, not stand-alone subsidiaries. The low level of international competition provided comfortable profits for the Japanese pharma industry, and most companies didn’t have the financial motivation to expand internationally. The Japanese government protected its pharmaceutical industry for many years against the onslaught of large overseas companies. However, by the end of the ‘80s, there were clear signals that this protection was coming to an end. The Japanese pharma industry realized there would eventually be fierce international competition at home, and larger companies began planning the move into overseas markets.
Shiro Yamasaki knew these companies were entering a new era. He also saw the wide gap in the business culture that Japanese pharma had to bridge to have a chance of success in the U.S., and for American and European pharma to succeed in Japan. Medical treatment methods, health care systems, government regulations, marketing and communications differ from country to country and create unique pharmaceutical industry environments and cultures in each place. “Big Pharma” companies had been globalizing for decades. But in 1990, the Japanese industry was just learning that globalization actually meant localization in many markets.
At that time, Japanese pharma’s U.S. subsidiaries each had only a handful of employees, most transferred from Japan. None were yet marketing drugs in the U.S. Efforts towards international harmonization of drug approvals were just beginning, and Japanese companies’ drug development work only took place in Japan.
The Japanese drug industry had some catching up to do, and New York Pharma Forum was a perfect vehicle to bring the Japanese together with their American counterparts. At NYPF, they could be exposed to the workings of the American and international pharmaceutical industry and learn more about the American business culture and healthcare system. At the same time, American companies welcomed the chance to meet and talk to visiting Japanese government officials in an informal setting, and to get to know senior pharma executives sent here from Japan.
New York Pharma Forum was launched in December, 1990 with its first symposium, the First Annual General Assembly, followed by a black tie dinner at the Waldorf Astoria's Skylight Roof. If memory serves, about 70 people came to the symposium, and about 200 attended the dinner. There were dinner speeches by Ed Pratt, then the CEO of Pfizer, and by Shigeo Morioka, CEO of Yamanouchi Pharmaceutical Co., who, along with Haruo Naito, Director General of Eisai Co., came from Tokyo to participate in the launch. Mr. Naito gave the “kampai,” or toast, and then took part in a Kagamiwari ceremony, for which he and several of the other VIPs in attendance donned traditional happi coats and then broke open a sake barrel to share with all the guests. We hired a dance band for the occasion, but I was told by the Japanese executives there was little likelihood that Japanese couples would dance. My staff and I received calls from some Japanese executives before that first dinner asking us, at the instruction of their wives (yes, they were all men), what the women should wear and whether a kimono was appropriate since it was considered formal wear in Japan. Some of the newcomers weren’t sure what the expression “black tie” really meant. They were anxious to fit in and wanted to be properly attired.
Those of us who were there 25 years ago can attest to vast differences between then and now. Some were minor: the Japanese never call anymore to ask what to wear, since they’re just as savvy as Americans (and in some cases, more so!) about Western-style entertainment. Everyone agreed after a few years to move to the American way of restricting long speeches to the afternoon business symposium. So the annual dinner became a gala dinner-dance, with plenty of American and Japanese couples dancing.
For deeper and more important differences, stay tuned for the next blog post.
Lucy Siegel
Bridge Global Strategies LLC
(Secretariat, New York Pharma Forum)