Very coherent to me...
Vivek is Part of Big Pharma and Made $$ on a Failed Alzheimer’s Drug:
WRONG on both. Calling Vivek part of big pharma is about as insane as calling Rumble part of Big Tech. It’s also funny because most big pharma executives really don’t like Vivek, because he called pharma’s corrupt bluff of soft coordination on which drugs they’d develop versus not to actually rescue medicines that big pharma had abandoned – and he built a multibillion dollar company of his own in the process. That’s how he ended up developing a staggering *five* new FDA-approved products, including lifesaving and life-changing therapies. That’s one of the best track records for a new biotech company in modern history, and it’s why most pharma executives aren’t particularly fond of him.
(Side note: Vivek invested early in Rumble when it was still a private company, to challenge Big Tech’s orthodoxies – in the same way Vivek’s first company Roivant challenged Big Pharma’s orthodoxies).
One of the drugs that Vivek developed was a drug for Alzheimer’s disease, through one of Roivant’s subsidiaries called Axovant. Like 99.7% of all drugs tested for Alzheimer’s disease, it failed. Unlike most of Roivant’s subsidiaries which went on to become immensely successful – and Roivant (the parent company) which is a nearly $10BN public company today – Axovant ended up failing after the Alzheimer’s drug was terminated. But the idea that Vivek made any money on that failure is a total lie. To the contrary: Vivek could have sold shares in Axovant before its failure. But he didn’t. And neither did Roivant. That was an unusual decision, and some would even call it honorable.
(The in-the-weeds critics will say: “But he sold some shares in Roivant, didn’t he?” Answer: yes, he and other shareholders were forced to sell a tiny portion of their shares in 2015 to facilitate an outside investor entering Roivant in 2015. And the shares that Roivant Vivek sold back then are worth a LOT more today than they were back then).
Bottom line: one of the therapies Vivek helped develop is a life-saving therapy in kids – as a father of two young sons, that is the accomplishment in his life that he is most proud of. He has also overseen the development of other medicines, including for psoriasis, prostate cancer, endometriosis, and uterine fibroids.
