Yuhan Innovates R&D Organization

Company’s first female executive introduces transitional research in her company’s bid to develop new drugs like multinational pharmas

Pharmaceutical companies spend astronomical costs and time to develop new innovative medicines, but the problem is that the return on investments is too low due to a high attrition. In reality, Korean pharmaceutical companies lack multi-disciplinary collaboration: chemists and toxicologists separately are engaged in research in their own fields, causing unsatisfactory research outcomes which can hardly be translated into new innovative medicines to address unmet medical needs. In addition, the isolated, disconnected R&D efforts take unnecessary, inappropriate amount of cost, resource and time.
At a forum on new drugs in Seoul in June, Dr. Su-Youn Nam, executive director in charge of R&D at Yuhan Corp., stressed the need for instituting transitional research, a new paradigm in R&D that focuses on multi-disciplinary collaboration to all of the elements and processes in alignment with clinical, regulatory and commercial strategy, brining efficiency and productivity to obsolete, bureaucratic R&D approaches of many of Korean pharmaceutical companies.
On May 1, Yuhan said it appointed Nam to head up R&D strategy division exploring opportunities for new innovative drugs, managing R&D projects, forging partnerships in Korea and abroad across early discovery and clinical development . At that time, Yuhan said Nam’s appointment will likely facilitate R&D collaboration with bioventure companies and academic institutions through open innovation and external expertise. The pharmaceutical company also expressed the hope that it will spur its own capability of establishing the R&D strategies and eventually translating it into breakthrough medicines.
Nam, who graduated from Yonsei University Medical College with the honors in 1991, could be summed up as a four-time first ― the first female professor at the internal medicine department of Yonsei University Medical College, the youngest female medical director of Roche Korea, the first medical doctor working as medical director role of Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. Korea and then advanced to Asia Pacific regional medical head and finally became a global medical director heading up the global R & D projects at Bristol-Myers Squibb global R &D, USA. As of May 1 this year, she moved back to Korea to be the first female executive of Yuhan Corp., leading R&D organization.
Nam said, “My major job has so far been with transforming the 25 year-old R&D system into an innovative, nimble and translational one.” In reality, Korean companies lack in-house communication, so sharing corporate goals and getting every employee on board for a journey toward clearly set-out is of paramount importance. Another critical factor to make this drastic transformation happen is that Yuhan CEO and senior leadership have provided full support to her initiative in establishing cross functional, open forum,” through which brilliant strategies can be coupled with excellent execution by removing any communication gap, time delay and operational hurdles.” With Nam’s appointment, Yuhan has shifted its research, technology and development (RT&D) paradigm from a function-oriented structure to a task-oriented one.
Korean pharmaceutical companies, including Yuhan, are striving to achieve two goals ― growth and profitability ― amidst a stream of challenges, including the lack of R & D outputs with thin and poor pipeline, continuing pressure on pharmaceutical price cuts, the pending Korea-U.S. Free Trade Agreement, the strengthening transparency of the distribution industry, and a rise in manufacturing costs, caused by the advancement of good manufacturing practices (GMP).
In a bid to tide over the current crisis, Yuhan announced on Aug. 1 its vision of building a patient-centric innovations with the goal of becoming a global premiere customer-focused pharmaceuticals company. In order to translate this vision into action, Yuhan has also established a new RT&D regime and revamped its research organization. Yuhan’s new R&D strategy, differentiating it from other rival pharmaceutical firms, is designed to stress “innovative,” “nimble” and “translational” research approaches.
REORGANIZATION ― The biggest dilemma facing the development of new drugs is a sharp drop in productivity. Regulatory authorities enforce more stringent approval regulations, causing a cost push in R&D outlays related to the development of new drugs, whereas a wider scope of treatment and segmentation, coupled with medical technology development, makes it hard to develop new blockbuster drugs.
Yuhan has revamped its R&D organization to fix its lower productivity compared to its rival companies. The pharmaceutical company expects the reorganization to enhance productivity and efficiency and secure an agile, concentrated, responsible RT&D process.
The reorganization calls for operating nine cross functional open forum called Disease Strategy Teams (DST), comprising of cardiovascular metabolics, pulmonology, neurology, immunology, oncology, gastroenterology, quality of life (QOL); and others including technology platform along with seven INT (Innovative, Nimble, Translational) R&D units.
DSTs are consultation forums in which experts from R&D strategies, the R&D Institute, Clinical Development, Regulatory, Commercial departments regularly explore new opportunities for the variety scope generics, incrementally modified drugs, herbal medicines, new innovative targets and biologics, and evaluate in-licensing projects. They are designed to explore new opportuniies tailored not only to satisfy unmet medical needs but also to create new markets in addition to developing their mid- and long-term strategies and managing their process.
The INT R&D units are charged with carrying out tasks established by the DSTs. The INT units are reorganized into a task-oriented format in which all members take collective responsibility for the successful execution of projects, departing from the past’s function-oriented one.
Yuhan plans to implement future growth strategies with the goal of becoming a world-class pharmaceutical company by capitalizing on the revamped organization and newly established RT&D regime, as many Korean pharmaceutical companies are scrambling to strengthen global networks and ramp up their overseas presence.
Nam believes that her dream of developing new drugs in Korea will come true. “I’ve learned many things while working at a global R&D field at multinationals, so I want to bear fruit by making a good use of them, and I bet that this can be realized by harmonized team work along with support from senior leadership toward the common goal.”
Asked about her stint at Yuhan, Nam said she is quite confident that her dream could be realized since she feels that her company seems to be on the same wavelength as hers. She also cited Yuhan’s reputation and integrity and the amount of leeway she received in the R&D field.
Nam said researchers are encouraged to take one and a half year timeframe from target discovery to the entry into clinical development and they appear to be responsive in an affirmative fashion as they now have clear tasks with good support. She said Yuhan could produce new drugs in two or three years, even though they are mostly in the pipeline to be ready for release around 2015. nw

Dr. Su-Youn Nam, executive director in charge of R&D at Yuhan Corp.

Yuhan Corp. headquarters in Dongjak-gu Seoul.

Yuhan Corp.’s research center in Giheung, Gyeonggi-do.