Many good points discussed. To sum it up, POC glucometer stripes just got a stern FDA slap to not test using their device since you don't report glucose but reducing sugar using their dehydrogenase stripe. They knew about this years ago, but didn't do anything to reformulate. Next, they never built their automation line to track to the Swiss Cobas Integra line. Their new Cobas line are mini-clones of the modular with poor drug immunoassay performance and their open channels aren't very accessible. The promise of hepC on the modulars for years has also been pretty laughable.

you are so not funny

Why a black meter? For diabetic African Americans?

All is quiet due to Q3 and near year end. DC is launching a new Aviva black meter soon. Nothing else to sell. The Born in the USA campaign was a hit wonder out of Marketing. Still have maltose interferance with the black meter.

No clue who would replace MT. Whoever DoD puts in will send a strong message about his management style. I think the risk of the new leader being worse than MT is pretty low- MT is really a terrible business leader and is about as bad as they come.

Who will lead RMS in Pleasanton was DoD is officially in his new role?

Who do you think will replace MT? Are you certain that the alternatives are better?

All is quiet right now. People in Indy are anxiously awaiting the removal of MT so that operations can be stabilized and put back on a growth curve.

Ok, so the thread has quieted down. What's going on?

Story is that FDA is at Branchburg and is heading to Indy. There was a recent inspection by two dudes but nothing of significance was found.

Are folks starting to position themselves for the expected shake up when DoD take over Diagnostics?

sounds like you're a cry baby...

This isn't a rumor mill anymore, it's a friggin' lame ass sob story. Bunch of cry babies is what I see in the near 500 posts. For the last time, MM, KK, MT, are all a bunch of incompetent heads...we get it.
Mol Dia will not be combined with App Science because it's not the same business, although very few people understand this. DC is in the tank and will be for years (those steaks and fireworks were awesome a few years ago though, remember!!!) Born in the USA campaign for accuchek -damn, all those marketing people and this is the best they could come up with? For real? Pull out your Bruce album from 1985 and there it is. Genius! I guess Puerto Rico is considered a US territory. CD is limping through their usual ways, hello supply chain got any reagents to ship? You bet we do for LabCorp but the rest of you will get screwed. All in all, another text book year for Roche indy. If you get bored, pull out your mirror and look at yourself, that's really the only person you can blame. Again I say, genius! Now where did those ACID paintings go??? Anyone notice anything from a common sense perspective or do I need to say more?

That's because SH is the biggest joker of them all. He put the warning letter in terms of the tv show "Deal, or no Deal". Leave it to Yate's "love child".

SH's manufacturing/ops/quality teams are staffed with a bunch of people who would have easily beat out Heath Ledger if allowed to audition in the Dark Knight. A bunch of complete jokers.

Seems very quiet in Indy these days. Maybe the calm before the storm-can't wait to see DoD kick MT and his cronies to the dumpster where they belong!

what is happening in their diabetes care division these days?

How is the integration of Ventana into the business? Did Roche buy this business at retail + now?

Was it really worth it?

Yeah, like back in the day when we had three to five reps calling on the same account.

A good idea, it should have been done years ago. Internally produced confusion of product lines only helps the competition.

Given the shared PCR product lines possibly they will merge Life Science business (AS) with Molecular Diagnostics.

Mary McCain has a project going in Indy warehousing for Genentech. Perhaps Louisville will be shut down soon. MM pulled a project manager from her duties to fulfill the request of the warehousing, supply chain.

Nobody maybe?

WK is eager to join Genentech with his team anyways and the rest of RMD could be merged with RPD in Switzerland

Who will replace DoD as Head of RMD?

It was reported as 20% but was much more like 30-35% in certain areas. In total, 20 million was saved by the layoffs. Guess that's what earned DoD the promotion.

DoD got rid of a number of top execs at RMD during his first year. Some went right away, others after the reorg, and the last when he determined that they could not cut it in his new environment. Others were demoted. His last move at RMD was to lay off 20% of the staff (Europe was not included). Maybe that won him the big promotion.

Why should he? He did the same thing at Molecular in Pleasanton. Make no mistake: they are more similar than you might think.

all quiet... hasn't DoD fired MT yet?

The DC for Genentech in Louisville is outsourced to FedEx and UPS. There is no physical Genentech site.

This is somewhat old news. Mr Humer had announced during his vist that Roche is staying in Indy. Indy is already the "de facto" US distribution center for diagnostics. As soon as a few more product lines are transferred, Indy will be the true US distribution center for diagnostics.

Now, where it gets interesting is whether Pharma and Diagnostics supply chain will be combined. Genentech has a distribution center in Louisville, which is relatively near Indy. It makes great economic sense to combine and close one of the two sites. Indy does have manufacturing, IT, sales and marketing as well as Supply Chain. My understanding is that the Louisville facility is strictly a DC. So do you transfer Indy's Supply Chain to Louisville and leave two warehouse buildings empty or do you transfer Genentech distribution to Indy and close Louisville. My bet is the latter.

"Yo vi el trabajo de papel sobre la mesa de mis supervisores que dijo Roche Indianápolis, centro de distribución de EE.UU."
=
"I saw the paper work on the table of my supervisors said Roche Indianapolis, U.S. distribution center"

Any more details?

Yo vi el trabajo de papel sobre la mesa de mis supervisores que dijo Roche Indianápolis, centro de distribución de EE.UU.

The announcement about DoD is a huge slap in the face to JS! JS was very hard on DoD. DoD, who is a very even keeled person, got to the point where he avoided speaking with MT because of his arrogant abusive manner. DoD has the opportunity to turn the U.S. commercial team attitude around if he makes rapid and bold moves to fire MT and his cronies while now. Don't delay DoD, you will get more mileage out of swift and decisive action.
MT, I hope you plan to seek new employment outside of the medical industry. Your day of reckoning has come. Your reputation is utterly destroyed in the IVD industry.

DoD should start by cleaning house across the upper reaches of the org, then deep diving in US, starting with MT. Although I think he's packing his bags now...

Do'D is DOA at diagnostics. I certainly can't blame him for taking the promotion, but he is in way over his head. Perhaps he can look outside the Roche "box" and find some industry veterans who have the commodity dx scars, but also have the scars from living on the cutting edge of Dx (Pharmacogenetic testing experience, reference lab, therapeutics, devices). If you are going to transform the company, it first needs a transfusion (new blood). let's see if he can take advantae of his honeymoon perdiod to stir things up.

MT and KK were never on the extended Corporate EC. MT is on the Diagnostics EC and I don't think KK is on either.

So now we know the real reason for Dr. Humer's visit last week: to tell KK and MT that not only did they not get the coveted head of Diagnostics job, they were also kicked off the "extended" executive committee. WHAT A SLAP IN THE FACE!!!!!

Maybe SS and Dr. Humer are smarter than we have been giving them credit.

KK and MT can now go crawl in the hole that they dug for themselves. Their larger than life egos can't cover up their spectacular lack of leadership. let' see, on the KK side, he surrounded himself with a bunch of cronies (at least two of whom are raging alcoholics - yea, you know who they are - they were in Vegas this past weekend) who haven't really done anything other than protect their own jobs. on the MT side, well there's the skirt chasing, monstrous arrogance, endless reorgs... I could go on but you get the point.

Will the severance cover MT's prostitute services?

JS and MT jointly agreed on the strategy for adressing the US Diagnostic(Indy)failures over the last year. JS's endorsement of the approach provided some level of "cover" for MT. With a new COO for global diagnostics coming into power (with JS's retirement)MT has to face the music on his own. I suspect HR is already working on the severance package for him....

Roche announces new Corporate Executive Committee
William M. Burns, Juergen Schwiezer and Jonathan Knowles to retire – Pascal Soriot appointed COO Pharma Division and Daniel O’Day appointed COO Diagnostics Division – Jean-Jacques Garaud and Dan Zabrowski to become Members of Enlarged Executive Committee – Ian Clark appointed CEO Genentech. See
http://www.roche.com/media/media_releases/med-cor-2009-09-08.htm

Can someone post the announcement please?

Will MT be the new boss of Molecular Diagnostics?

Announcement is out

Rumor us that there will be announcement this week of JS's retirement, his replacement and a major Worldwide reorginization.

I think what get's folks worked up about Roche Diagnostics is that it's legacy of great products, people and growth has been squandered by the Swiss with weak leadership and bean counters calling the shots. This was a division (Indy) that had everthing going for it for decades until the Swiss made obvious, stupid decisions.

I would characterize Andre DB and Jack VK as international managers, not Swiss nor Germans. Both had managed US companies for years.
MM was a Hybrid, raised as a manager in the US since being in product management at Boehringer Mannheim.
Hubert R was a successful German who had multiple assignments in the US to prepare him for the CEO slot.

Again MT is unique in that he was placed at the Helm for RD in the US without any US experienc.

Historically international CEO's have done well with US profits. Hubert, Andre, Martin, and Jack did very well. Denny, a US CEO during Roche days was extremely successful but was fired by a jealous Basil. Roche/ BM always did well with great business leaders at the helm. Not even close now.

I think a respectful European leader could do very well. Look at MM. The issue is that MT is disrespectful, arrogant, unethical and dictatorial. Overall, he is a lousy leader-German or American.

The top management of Roche made a fatal mistake when they placed a Eurpean in charge of the largest US Diagnostic site (Indy). An American "puppet" or "yes man" is nearly as bad as having a European at the helm. Boehringer Mannheim learned this lesson in the 1980's and was able to turn the US operations into a cash machine, where people loved to work with American CEO's.

The management cultures (Swiss, American) are too different. Americans do not like arrogance, and right now the Swiss hate Americans with the US Government destroying their bank secrecy/ security blanket. I have personal friends at Swiss banks, and the banks are forbiding travel by employees to the US right now.

In the total scheme of things, Diagnostics is secondary to Pharma for Roche, and Indy is just a "pimple on the a*s" of a succesful global health care conglomerate. The Swiss will fix Indy eventually, while today Dr. H. and SS are enjoying enormous successes within other product line and geographies.

Is JS the famous Mr. Standard working according to Disraeli words, there are lies, bad lies and statistics.

Heard that JS is retiring at the end of 2009-good riddance! Now Mr H needs to ensure that SS brings in someone who is able to eliminate all of the JS cronies that he put in positions of power and are now destroying shareholder value. MT, with your buddy no longer able to cover your obvious, numerous massive incompetencies, your days are numbered as CEO in Indy to which I say- good riddance!

WBS is the best example of what's wrong in Indianapolis- a self-righteous, self-satisfied, spiteful, manipulative manager who lacks any level of self awareness. It is a travesty that she is in part responsible for driving cultural change when she represents everything that needs to change.