Author Profile: Don Drakeman
Donald Drakeman, PhD, was the founding CEO of the US biotech company that pioneered the development of the checkpoint inhibitor cancer treatments recognized in the Nobel Prize for Medicine 2018. These products, YERVOY and OPDIVO, are being used to treat many different forms of cancer. He is a Fellow in Operations and Technology Management at the Cambridge Judge Business School, Distinguished Research Professor in the Center for Citizenship and Constitutional Government at the University of Notre Dame, and a Venture Partner at Advent Life Sciences. His publications have been cited in numerous patents and by the Supreme Court of the United States. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology. A graduate of Columbia Law School, he received a PhD from Princeton University.
Why I Wanted to Write this Book
My hope in writing this book was that everyone touched by the biotech industry — scientists, managers, investors, policy makers, physicians and patients — could understand better how the amazing breakthroughs of the last half century of biomedical research have been converted into important new medicines.
Recent Media and Publications
The Risk of De-Risking Innovation: Optimal R&D Strategies in Ambiguous Environments
May 2020
(with Nektarios Oraiopoulos)
This article develops a framework for driving innovation under highly ambiguous conditions. An analysis of the most novel medicines of the past 20 years shows that a very large group of small companies created more breakthroughs, at considerably less overall cost, than a much smaller group of very large companies. This article’s findings present the first large-scale empirical validation of the theoretical literature predicting the superiority of decentralized parallel searches in ambiguous environments. Accordingly, companies that attempt to “de-risk” the innovation portfolio by narrowing their search efforts to minimize failures run the risk of filtering out the next breakthrough.
May 2020
(with Nektarios Oraiopoulos and Christopher Loch)
We have studied the origins of the highest-priority new medicines of the last two decades – the ones that improve our treatment of patients with serious and life-threatening diseases. In other words: exactly what we need right now. The clear message is that command-and-control processes where the world’s leading experts come together to focus resources on what seem to be the most promising ideas — an approach that would be the natural tendency of almost any czar — is actually less likely to come up with something new and important. Instead, what we need is a multiple-shots-on-goal approach that would allow us to test as many and as diverse ideas as possible, some of which will seem crazy to some experts, at least until they start working (or can unambiguously be ruled out).
Renovation as Innovation: is Repurposing the Future of Drug Discovery Research?
January 2019
(with Nektarios Oraiopoulos and Arthur Neuberger)
Repurposing is increasingly hailed as a solution to the problems of the high costs and poor productivity of drug development. Instead of starting with a disease and beginning the laborious and expensive task of discovering a new drug, researchers can initiate the discovery process with a drug in hand, and simply look for the right disease. The question is: Will repurposing fulfill its promise and, if so, should we scale back our commitment to basic research and novel drug discovery, and focus instead on second-chance drugs?
Lemons, or Squeezed for Resources? Information Symmetry and Asymmetric Resources in Biotechnology
2017
(with Nektarios Oraiopoulos and Arthur Neuberger)
Thousands of biotech companies are developing promising products, but have insufficient resources to complete the clinical testing process, while large, well-funded companies have increasingly focused on the need to access external innovation. As a result, licensing deals are an essential and growing part of this industry. Yet, casting a shadow over the licensing market is the classic Lemons Problem: Does asymmetrical information put licensees at a severe disadvantage, leading to a market dominated by inferior opportunities, with the best products retained for internal development? Our analysis of clinical stage products developed over three decades shows that there is no Lemons Problem. We discuss the results of this first apples-to-apples analysis of the biomedical licensing market, and suggest reasons why the Lemons Problem does not exist where it might be most expected—in a high technology, knowledge-based industry.
Benchmarking Biotech and Pharmaceutical Product Development
July 2014
The biotech sector's record in originating high-priority medicines exceeds that of the pharmaceutical industry, its costs are lower and its products have comparable revenues. Assumptions that may have been true in the industry's early years no longer provide an accurate picture of modern drug development.
Fishing for sharks: Partner Selection in Biopharmaceutical R&D Alliances
August 2013
(with Richard Mason)
A recent study of R&D alliances between new biotechnology firms (NBFs) and pharmaceutical firms investigated how NBFs deal with the “swimming with sharks” dilemma involved in allying with firms capable of appropriating value. It concludes that NBFs are less likely to select alliance partners with related expertise because of greater appropriation risk. Based on our experience as NBF managers and a survey of NBF executives, we believe that such situations are uncommon, and that the study more likely shows pharmaceutical firms seeking diversification. Thousands of NBFs seek alliances with the top 100 pharmaceutical firms, and the larger company is much more likely to be the one to select among multiple potential partners.
The Future of Monoclonal Antibody Technology
July 2010
(with Alexander Zider)
With the rapid growth of monoclonal antibody-based products, new technologies have emerged for creating modified forms of antibodies, including fragments, conjugates and multi-specific antibodies. We created a database of 450 therapeutic antibodies in development to determine which technologies and indications will constitute the “next generation” of antibody products. We conclude that the antibodies of the future will closely resemble the antibodies that have already been approved for commercial sale.
Second Annual High-Tech Hall of Fame draws 150
Winter 2000
The Biotechnology Council of New Jersey, Inc. and the American Electronics Association (AEA) hosted the Second Annual New Jersey High-Tech Hall of Fame Induction Dinner on Wednesday, October 18, at the Garden State Arts Center in Holmdel, New Jersey. This year’s inductees included Congressman Rodney Frelinghuysen, Senator Robert Singer, and industry leaders Dr. Lisa Drakeman and Dr. Donald Drakeman of Medarex, Inc. and Mr. Reuben F. Richards, Jr. of EMCORE.
Dr. Donald Drakeman is a founding Board member of the Biotechnology Council of New Jersey, and served as Chairman in 1997 and 1998. He also served as a member of Senator Singer’s Joint Legislative Biotechnology Task Force and is a current member of the BIO Board.