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Post by cretin11 on Jan 28, 2023 23:31:24 GMT -5
Split revenue with partners. We develop. They sell. Ideally this includes Afrezza as well. We can save money on our sales/marketing expenses. We have tried selling and the results are in.
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Post by phdedieu12 on Jan 28, 2023 23:42:10 GMT -5
So you're suggesting that we quit trying to develop and sell our own product and leave the selling to others? While I don't disagree with the theory especially in light of previous results, shouldn't look forward to breaking away from that? I won't beat the lack of sales to death, it's been discussed at nauseum, but it's tough to sell when you have no money. I'd like to see how sales improve this year before throwing this opportunity to someone else. Point being, wouldn't we want to go alone and keep all the revenue, rather than look for partners once again?
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Post by cretin11 on Jan 29, 2023 9:28:26 GMT -5
I certainly like the “keep all the money part” and on that we agree. We don’t have the right team in place to be effective at sales/marketing, so even if we have more money it is not best spent there. That opinion is simply based on our recent history. If we had any leadership with a successful track record in that regard, it would be different. But I prefer that companies stay in their lane and our lane is developing drugs for the TS platform. Our expectation was that we’d have multiple robust revenue streams by now, while we are obviously behind schedule we are creeping closer. If that pans out, we can thrive even without having 100% of any drug’s revenue. Especially since partners will sell many multiples of any drugs compared to what we would sell on our own. So I think the math should still work for us.
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Post by caesar on Jan 29, 2023 11:33:33 GMT -5
I get the point of view but don't we ultimately want to go alone rather than continually splitting with partners? Yes, we didn't have much of a choice when we were broke, but isn't the point of raising capital and becoming positive to no longer need partners? Being alone is no "fun"! Partners can become meaningful in many ways - United has a sales team in place that will ramp up sales ASAP. Just saying For what it's worth, a sales team that specializes in pulmonary diseases will be expensive to establish/build and will not be cheap to sustain. In addition, the new sales team will have to build a relationship (trust) with the medical community. United brings that to the table - that is what a partnership is all about. Furthermore, Mannkind will eventually be acquired, and I suspect that the current board of directors and Mike have a very good relationship with their United's counterparts. Best to keep building on this model. United is not Sanofi, nor is the relationship the same. Mannkind unloaded Afrezza to Sanofi and said, make a go of it and send me my cut. While Mannkind and United are collaborating - working together on a daily basis. |
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Post by sayhey24 on Jan 29, 2023 13:09:53 GMT -5
So you're suggesting that we quit trying to develop and sell our own product and leave the selling to others? While I don't disagree with the theory especially in light of previous results, shouldn't look forward to breaking away from that? I won't beat the lack of sales to death, it's been discussed at nauseum, but it's tough to sell when you have no money. I'd like to see how sales improve this year before throwing this opportunity to someone else. Point being, wouldn't we want to go alone and keep all the revenue, rather than look for partners once again? I think caesar is spot on. Building sales teams that sell are not cheap. Keeping all of nothing is nothing. If MNKD can focus on manufacturing and get great partners like UTHR for Tyvaso DPI they can make a lot more money as more and more DPI products are developed. BTW - thats not really me saying that, that was what Al Mann envisioned and the MNKD model he had hoped to build. The vision was DPI is a platform and we will have many partners. Lets face it, so far MNKDs sales efforts are pretty much a failure. Yes, there are lots of reasons with the biggest being not understanding the market and what its going to take to sell into it. With UTHR they are already selling to the pulmonologists who know UTHR and MNKD as a team and if Tyvaso DPI is great so should their new product. |
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Post by prcgorman2 on Jan 29, 2023 13:18:31 GMT -5
Development partners reduce risk of failure to bring a product to market by absorbing some of the cost of development. And has been mentioned UTHR has proven sales and marketing for pulmonary medications. If I remember, the $3B market for clofazimine is about 50% larger than the market for Tyvaso DPI. A $100M to $200M development partnership with UTHR and maybe a 15% to 20% royalty looks possible. Knowing what we do about royalties from Tyvaso DPI, the prospect of 50% to 100% greater royalties per unit on a 50% larger market seems very appealing to me.
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Post by prcgorman2 on Jan 29, 2023 13:37:37 GMT -5
I certainly like the “keep all the money part” and on that we agree. We don’t have the right team in place to be effective at sales/marketing, so even if we have more money it is not best spent there. That opinion is simply based on our recent history. If we had any leadership with a successful track record in that regard, it would be different. But I prefer that companies stay in their lane and our lane is developing drugs for the TS platform. Our expectation was that we’d have multiple robust revenue streams by now, while we are obviously behind schedule we are creeping closer. If that pans out, we can thrive even without having 100% of any drug’s revenue. Especially since partners will sell many multiples of any drugs compared to what we would sell on our own. So I think the math should still work for us. From my perspective, there are two things wrong with your views.
First I disagree with your opinion about whether we have "the right team in place to be effective at sales/marketing". I don't think the team is the problem. In my long rant(s) about the lack of sales for Afrezza, I've never said the team is wrong. Cripes, put a potato sack on both legs of each of the players for Manchester United and have them take on Argentina and guess how well they'll do in a match. The problem with sales is not the sales team, or even marketing, it's the lack of data needed to change the SoC and market 1:1 against other mealtime insulins. I think Oliver Brandicoot was a horrible Sanofi CEO (and apparently they eventually agreed with me), but I can guess it was an easy sell to the Board to can the Afrezza worldwide marketing agreement when they looked at the ramp on getting Afrezza on an even footing with the other prandial competitors, especially since Sanofi also wanted to sell Toujeo.
Second, I disagree pipeline is the only business MannKind should be in. I agree that it should be a focus and it is. The issue with looking for a marketing partner for Afrezza is the exact same issue that faced Sanofi and that faces MannKind now. There is no magic. The lack of data and the correspondingly flawed ADA Standard of Care is the problem, and finding a marketing partner will not change that. In fact, at this point, MannKind knows more about marketing Afrezza than any other company in the world. My opinion is a close #2 is VDEX and the only reason they're not #1 is because they're business model is not as a drug manufacturing and marketing company. MannKind would have to teach a marketing partner just like hiring a contractor. To heck with that. MannKind is a drug manufacturing and marketing company just like United Therapeutics, Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk, Sanofi, et cetera, but MNKD has the unique problem (regardless of who sells Afrezza) of needing data to back up the value of their (former) flagship product. I DO want MannKind to have 100% of Afrezza revenue, and I would never risk having another company taking on what Sanofi did and then dropped. For international marketing, fine. Domestically, never again. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.
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Post by casualinvestor on Jan 29, 2023 13:48:25 GMT -5
Since there's little/no competition in the space that CF is being developed for, that should make it easier to self-market. The orphan drug category should make approval easier too. This looks like a good option to make a "keeper"
Despite that a part of me is in favor of Mannkind staying a drug developer that applies DPI delivery to drugs where it makes sense. Sell and collect royalties, and find the next one. Farm out the lung disease drugs and keep the endocrine ones? Probably not that simple
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Post by stevil on Jan 29, 2023 13:56:35 GMT -5
The other issue that people aren’t (fully) taking into account, ar least as it pertains to MNKDs failed efforts with Afrezza is the access to physicians to sell as well as a convincing argument to prescribe.
A lot of reps are having trouble breaking through offices to get a face to face with a physician. A lot of offices have stopped seeing reps after COVID- for reasons I can’t imagine other than just wanting an excuse to say no. On top of that, and I should probably verify with my rep because I haven’t asked explicitly, but I don’t think they buy lunch for office staffs because that gets really expensive really quickly. My rep said he’ll get his foot in the door and talk to staff, they’ll be kind to him, act like they like the product, and then never prescribe it. Happens often with reps because people are either too “polite” or cowardly to be honest.
I’ve lived in 2 densely populated areas now that have been key targets for MNKDs sales team. Both times, you can sense the discouragement and almost lack of confidence in the reps. By that, I mean you can see they get rejected so many times and have so much difficulty selling the product that it weighs on them. It’s like they expect things to go wrong… probably because everything does. Outside of sayhey, I don’t know of a single human being that can run into a brick wall countless times and get back up for more. It’s hard to find those types, and even if we had them, I don’t think they’d be anymore successful- the barriers aren’t at their level to overcome.
It’s a really hard sell to walk into a doctors office with a novel product (and one that carries baggage from a botched Exubera) and change minds. It’s different because you inhale it. That was ultimately the angle the first rep I worked with used. It was almost embarrassing the data they bring with them from the stat study to show superiority with an n of 24 for study participants. Then, if they do get a few prescriptions written, prescribers will give up once they inevitably run into countless prior authorizations and appeals in an office already inundated by frivolous paperwork. No one wants the hassle. To be honest, there’s no way I’d think twice about prescribing Afrezza based on what the reps have said and shown to me. If I didn’t do all the research myself, I wouldnt believe in the product enough to waste my time.
Food for thought. I’m on the fence regarding if I want MNKD to go it alone or have a sales team. It depends on how good the results are. Anyone and their grandmother could sell Viagra. Doesn’t take talent to sell something with exceptional data and coverage. It’s more just a matter of getting boots on the ground and bringing food.
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Post by sayhey24 on Jan 29, 2023 14:00:12 GMT -5
Development partners reduce risk of failure to bring a product to market by absorbing some of the cost of development. And has been mentioned UTHR has proven sales and marketing for pulmonary medications. If I remember, the $3B market for clofazimine is about 50% larger than the market for Tyvaso DPI. A $100M to $200M development partnership with UTHR and maybe a 15% to 20% royalty looks possible. Knowing what we do about royalties from Tyvaso DPI, the prospect of 50% to 100% greater royalties per unit on a 50% larger market seems very appealing to me. Lets see the deal Mike can negotiate. Taking it all the way through approval might make sense then again bringing in a partner now may make sense. Then maybe 30% plus if its there product. I am sure our accountant is doing the NPV and NFV calculations and they are factoring in risk. I know I am hard on Mike sometimes because so far he has failed on afrezza but he is a really smart guy and so is the accountant. To be fair Mike knew nothing about the diabetes industry and never seemed to have a wingman until Kendall and then he left. |
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Post by sayhey24 on Jan 29, 2023 14:19:44 GMT -5
The other issue that people aren’t (fully) taking into account, ar least as it pertains to MNKDs failed efforts with Afrezza is the access to physicians to sell as well as a convincing argument to prescribe. A lot of reps are having trouble breaking through offices to get a face to face with a physician. A lot of offices have stopped seeing reps after COVID- for reasons I can’t imagine other than just wanting an excuse to say no. On top of that, and I should probably verify with my rep because I haven’t asked explicitly, but I don’t think they buy lunch for office staffs because that gets really expensive really quickly. My rep said he’ll get his foot in the door and talk to staff, they’ll be kind to him, act like they like the product, and then never prescribe it. Happens often with reps because people are either too “polite” or cowardly to be honest. I’ve lived in 2 densely populated areas now that have been key targets for MNKDs sales team. Both times, you can sense the discouragement and almost lack of confidence in the reps. By that, I mean you can see they get rejected so many times and have so much difficulty selling the product that it weighs on them. It’s like they expect things to go wrong… probably because everything does. Outside of sayhey, I don’t know of a single human being that can run into a brick wall countless times and get back up for more. It’s hard to find those types, and even if we had them, I don’t think they’d be anymore successful- the barriers aren’t at their level to overcome. It’s a really hard sell to walk into a doctors office with a novel product (and one that carries baggage from a botched Exubera) and change minds. It’s different because you inhale it. That was ultimately the angle the first rep I worked with used. It was almost embarrassing the data they bring with them from the stat study to show superiority with an n of 24 for study participants. Then, if they do get a few prescriptions written, prescribers will give up once they inevitably run into countless prior authorizations and appeals in an office already inundated by frivolous paperwork. No one wants the hassle. To be honest, there’s no way I’d think twice about prescribing Afrezza based on what the reps have said and shown to me. If I didn’t do all the research myself, I wouldnt believe in the product enough to waste my time. Food for thought. I’m on the fence regarding if I want MNKD to go it alone or have a sales team. It depends on how good the results are. Anyone and their grandmother could sell Viagra. Doesn’t take talent to sell something with exceptional data and coverage. It’s more just a matter of getting boots on the ground and bringing food. A convincing argument - how about stop the T2 progression so the PWD avoids all the treat to fail meds, cost and health decline? Maybe they can be saved a heart attack or two. But, no one is going to listen when they can't find it in the SoC unless they are pounding on their chests and yelling it with a megaphone. Now bringing food and bringing a new protocol to the lunch buffet I am all for. If they have PWDs willing to pay $99 a month thats one target market. For the Medicare group at $35 add the afrezza to the metformin or GLP1 or whatever. Thats an easy target. If they have to pay $600+ a month forget it. If these guys have a lack of confidence they clearly lack the proper leadership. If they don't have the proper data packets and presentation thats on leadership. Now there is no reason for lack of confidence even if no one is buying. They have the greatest thing since sliced bread and they need to believe that. Otto Rohwedder got laughed at more than once and had to sell his jewelry business as he was broke but he believed. If you are correct - "Houston we have a problem" and its a leadership problem. |
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Post by sportsrancho on Jan 29, 2023 17:00:05 GMT -5
“Outside of sayhey, I don’t know of a single human being that can run into a brick wall countless times and get back up for more.”
LOL… #ReallyLaughingOutLoud
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Post by lennymnkd on Jan 29, 2023 17:05:05 GMT -5
That’s the purpose of the redundancy of television advertising.
Breaks the ice with some familiarity to get the foot in the door .
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Post by Thundersnow on Jan 29, 2023 20:51:50 GMT -5
“Outside of sayhey, I don’t know of a single human being that can run into a brick wall countless times and get back up for more.” LOL… #ReallyLaughingOutLoud KEVINMIK and SAYHEY are TWINS!!!! |
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Post by prcgorman2 on Jan 30, 2023 7:50:24 GMT -5
“Outside of sayhey, I don’t know of a single human being that can run into a brick wall countless times and get back up for more.” LOL… #ReallyLaughingOutLoud KEVINMIK and SAYHEY are TWINS!!!! Persistence doesn’t make them twins. Sayhey24 is thoughtful, insightful, passionate, knowledgeable and endlessly innovative in addition to being persistent. If I had a company and was looking to hire someone, I’d hit up sayhey24 for no other reason than I know he would be a self-reliant achiever in no time. Maybe Mannkind should hire him to invigorate the sales team. They could take him on sales calls and the doctors, nurses, office staff, salespeople, and sayhey24 would all learn from each other. |
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