Most biotechs are small, research-oriented companies dedicated to applying genetics to curing a multitude of heartbreaking diseases, ranging from Alzheimer's to multiple sclerosis. A handful of companies -- such as Amgen, Genentech and Chiron -- have broken through the rest of the pack to become "fully integrated" like their Big Pharma cousins. The term "fully integrated" means that they manufacture as well as sell their own products. These "products" are proteins, which need to be injected since they are very large molecules compared to the synthetic molecules Big Pharma sells. The largest biotechs are actually mid-sized pharmaceutical companies in the way they function and are sometimes called "Big Biotech."

As for the largest Big Pharma players, most are either gobbling up small biotechs through outright acquisitions or, alternatively, entering into licensing agreements. This has been happening over the last decade, and is likely to continue throughout the rest of this decade, since it is increasingly difficult to find innovative new drugs through traditional science. In fact, innovation is the industry's biggest current challenge. Companies are using acquisitions and alliances to round out their product pipelines and meet investor expectations. Big drug manufacturers can now claim to research, manufacture and sell both synthetics and biologics. What this means to you is that you should include the largest biotechs as well as the largest traditional pharmaceuticals when planning a marketing career. That's good news since it increases the number of players and potential employers.

What you should keep in mind, however, is that the marketing models around which traditional pharmaceuticals and biotechs are developed are complementary. Pharmaceutical companies are generally organized around the "blockbuster" model, i.e., they derive most of their sales and profits from a handful of broadly acting drugs, which are mass-marketed to a broad patient population by a network of sales representatives, or "detail" people. This is the same model that brought Vioxx to the market and it is increasingly under attack. By industry consensus, a "blockbuster" is a drug whose annual revenue reaches or exceeds $1 billion. The biotech firms, on the other hand, tend to be organized around smaller franchises, i.e., their products are targeted to small patient populations with rare genetic diseases. Their biologics are sold by specialty sales representatives, who often have a relatively high degree of scientific knowledge. Because of this focus, biotech products are often referred to as specialty pharmaceuticals. To complicate matters, some biologics reach blockbuster status with respect to their revenue, since they are usually much more expensive than therapeutics. Considering that some biologics cost $10,000 per patient per year, you would need a mere 100,000 patients to reach $1 billion in revenue. Compare this to the millions of patients who ingest small molecule drugs like Prozac or Viagra.