With previous managerial responsibility for Asia and one eye on India's potentially vast drugs market, it was apt that Andrew Witty used the phrase "no sacred cows" in his first public comments on strategic priorities at GlaxoSmithKline.
During several months in purdah while preparing to take over as chief executive of the pharmaceuticals group, he consulted extensively with GSK shareholders, who have put up with several years of share price underperformance. Their message was clear: "More growth with less risk."
His response yesterday was a three-fold approach: to offer more diverse and global sources of growth, to generate more valuable products through better research and development, and to simplify his company's unwieldy structure.
"There's no point in dreaming about the 1990s," he said yesterday, reflecting on the sharp de-rating that has hit the drugs industry over the past decade. "There is concern that the sector has become low-growth and high-risk. GSK has to face that head on, and take control of our destiny."
In the most striking example of his new drive for geographical and product diversity, Mr Witty unveiled plans for an alliance with Aspen, a South African generic drugmaker. This is a new twist on the rising trend for large pharmaceuticals groups to expand their portfolio into off-patent drugs (see box).
The deal with Aspen is a way for GSK to broaden its product range, amortise the costs of its distribution networks, and exploit the fact that emerging markets are more relaxed about the boundaries between prescription and nonprescription medicines, and between patented and branded generic drugs.
As soon as next week, Mr Witty said several of his senior country and regional managers will meet Aspen to discuss which of its 1,200 products they would like to license for sale in their own markets.
Mr Witty's Aspen alliance - unlike other pharmaceuticals groups that have taken an interest in generics - avoids the costs and risks of acquiring another company outright. Instead, he hopes to take advantage of Aspen's low-cost manufacturing expertise, and share profits on the sales of drugs outside its core market of sub-Saharan Africa.
For GSK, India is a prime focus. The company's deep colonial roots explain why it, unlike many rivals, remained in the country after political changes in the 1970s made it more difficult for western companies with patented medicines to operate successfully.
The result, as Mr Witty highlighted on Tuesday, is that GSK has a network of 1,800 sales representatives in India, which now represents a quarter of the company's products sold by volume and is growing fast.
More generally, GSK remains committed not only to its traditional portfolio of chemical molecules, but also to more biological drugs, as well as vaccines and consumer healthcare products.
It hopes by opening its portfolio of experimental medicines to external scrutiny, from venture capitalists and healthcare purchasers, it will deliver more effective and relevant treatments.
Recognising that forecasting the market potential of new medicines is highly unpredictable, and that even drugs with relatively modest annual sales help spread risk, Mr Witty is shifting the selection criteria to turn GSK from what he dubs "blockbuster-dependent" to "blockbuster-ready".
With new partnerships with outside researchers, and support from a GSK venture fund with substantial extra resources, he predicts up to half of the company's drugs will come from outside in future, compared with 25-30 per cent today.
A final area for change is greater simplification of processes and deeper cost cuts across the company. This will include everything from outsourcing more of the production of its 40,000 varieties of medicines packaging, to trying to make money from some of its sophisticated manufacturing processes.
In spite of the new measures unveiled yesterday, the market was unimpressed. The shares fell slightly by 3½p to £12.21. Kevin Wilson, an analyst at Citigroup, was upbeat though, saying the shares "represent a relatively safe haven, combined with new strategic intent, in a market where earnings uncertainty is far from over".
It is too early to judge how successful Mr Witty's new priorities will prove and whether he can deliver on his promise to investors. But he has at least moved rapidly to update the legacy of his predecessor, Jean-Pierre Garnier, at a time when the pharmaceuticals industry must change or face decline.
