Challenges, Challenges, Challenges.

Just following on from yesterday's blog entry it seems to me that in each of those "Company stages" there are different challenges that the Company will be addressing. 


Note that my comments below are by no means trying to tell the Company what they should be doing. They are just the things that we should be watching for about our Company to measure how successfully they are progressing.


SHORT TERM


In the Short Term we are looking for QuantiFERON-TB to be progressing towards becoming the most widely used latent TB diagnostic in the developed world. To date we have achieved a high recognition in the market and modest sales. A major trigger for the increase in penetration is the imminent release of the CDC guidelines. We should be looking for the company to use these guidelines in conjunction with the available scientific proof to push hard into the market. I'm not personally sure what the best approach is here (but I'm sure the company is). Maybe it involves marketing to different levels of the TB chain - ie moving down from the top through the decision makers, coal face practitioners and even patients. It may even require the expending of some of our carefully husbanded cash. It will be interesting to watch events unfold and see how they fit into the puzzle of how this progression is going to be driven.


MEDIUM TERM


In the medium term the Company will need to push new products through the development and marketing pipeline. No doubt the existing network and product recognition will assist in this. Additionally, the Company itself will have learnt a lot about this from its experience with QTF-TB. Experience is a massive asset - one that we have perhaps not previously valued. 


We would hope that all of these factors will make additional product stories shorter than has been for QTF-TB. 


LONG TERM.


This is all about one of my favourite topics - vision. Any Company that has a long term, successful future must have a vision about where it is going. It is never good enough to just "go with the flow". You can only drive future success if you have some idea of the form that success will take. It is never too early to have a vision. Furthermore, it is never wrong to change that vision as the future unfolds. 


Whereas the short and medium term drivers of success are the current business, the future vision is all about the company. To me, these are quite different things. A business generates profits, a company manages those profits (as assets) for the best possible commercial returns.






One final thing. Poster "malta" has written an excellent post over here. Worth reading in my opinion. Cheers malta.