It was 1984 when 25-year-old Michael Wilson moved to Ann Arbor to become a pharmaceutical researcher. His first assignment: join the team developing a new drug called Lipitor.
“We had no idea it was going to be that big,” Wilson says. “It was supposed to be the third or fourth cholesterol-lowering agent to hit the market … but in the testing, it did much better than all the rest.”
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Today Lipitor earns $12.9 billion per year, by far the most profitable medicine in history, but its patents (and most of those profits) expire in 2010. In 2002 Pfizer Inc. bought the rights to Lipitor and the Ann Arbor R&D campus where Wilson and more than 2,100 others worked. Last year, however, amid massive companywide cuts, Pfizer announced plans to close the complex by late 2008.
Wilson, now 49, is one of 13 Pfizer scientists recruited by the University through multiple efforts to keep Pfizer’s most talented scientists in the state.
In January 2007, after Pfizer announced its plans to leave Michigan, President Mary Sue Coleman pulled together rapid response teams to tackle the challenges from multiple fronts. She also established a $3 million fund, administered by Provost Teresa Sullivan, to attract and hire Pfizer employees into research-track positions.
“A major change like this one forces all of us to take risks and try new ideas,” Coleman says. “We believe that by making an investment in these talented people, we could not only help lessen the impact of the Pfizer move in the short term, but also strengthen the foundations of the region for the longer-term future.”
Sullivan adds, “These scientists bring significant experience in drug research to the University. We look forward to their contributions to our programs in pharmacy and medicine.”
Ten scientists joined the College of Pharmacy, including six at the newly formed Center for Drug Design and its core Medicinal Chemistry Core Synthesis Lab, directed by Hollis Showalter, a 30-year veteran of the pharmaceutical industry. Initial center forays include drug discovery research related to cancer, rare diseases such as Gaucher disease, inflammatory bowel disease and infectious diseases including tuberculosis. The team already is collaborating with the Medical School, the Life Sciences Institute, the Center for Chemical Genomics and other U-M and external units.
Ron Woodard, chair and professor in the Department of Medicinal Chemistry, spearheaded the college’s effort to establish the center and lab and to hire Pfizer scientists to staff them.
“They add exciting, innovative dimensions to our education and research mission,” he says.
Some former Pfizer researchers have joined other pharmacy programs, the Medical School and the Master of Pharmaceutical Engineering program.
“This is an excellent case where the University saw a need to quickly build up its strength in the area of drug discovery and at the same time take advantage of a significant emphasis in this area by a departing company,” says Steve Forrest, vice president for research. “It has been a clear win-win situation for both U-M and the researchers who have every reason to remain in our area.”
As major manufacturers cut their payrolls, U-M and its University Research Corridor partners, Michigan State University and Wayne State University, are boosting business-supported R&D, taking over some Pfizer facilities and equipment and hiring top people from industries that are downsizing.
Ann Arbor SPARK, U-M’s economic development partner, estimates that more than 400 former Pfizer employers have been hired by more than 80 Michigan employers. SPARK also has helped organize 23 new startup companies begun by former Pfizer people.
Wilson, now a U-M associate research scientist after working 24 years at the nearby Pfizer R&D campus, said one reason he and his wife opted to stay in Ann Arbor was because their children are 7 and 11. Wilson didn’t want to uproot his children but they still were impacted, because many of their classmates moved as their parents took Pfizer transfers to other states.
Could Wilson wind up working on another blockbuster drug like Lipitor at U-M?
“I’d like to think in a university setting, there’s always that potential,” he says.
