Client Context
A leading pharmaceutical company with a well‑established brand in a competitive category sought to better understand payer responses to evolving market dynamics that threatened the brand’s historically strong access.
The Business Challenge
Despite a history of strong sales and positive formulary coverage, the client faced growing uncertainty as market conditions evolved. The entry of an authorized generic, alongside other competitive and regulatory developments, introduced new pressure on access strategies within the category. The client needed a clearer understanding of how these changes were influencing payer priorities and formulary management, and how branded products could remain differentiated as cost, flexibility, and competitive dynamics increasingly shaped access decisions.
Capabilities Applied
- Payer Formulary Decision-maker Interviews
- Market Access Strategy
- Competitive Landscape Assessment
- Payer Messaging Optimization
Approach
HawkPartners partnered with the client to frame the most critical access questions in a rapidly evolving environment across health plans, PBMs, and IDNs. We defined a focused set of high-probability access scenarios grounded in emerging regulatory changes and competitive dynamics to understand how payer behavior was likely to shift.
We then engaged payer decision-makers to assess how these scenarios were influencing formulary strategy in practice. This was complemented by adjacent research capturing pharmacist perspectives on the authorized generic, yielding a more complete view of how decisions were being shaped across the healthcare ecosystem.
Impact
Insights from the research revealed how market changes were reshaping payer priorities, with increased focus on cost containment, contracting flexibility, and product differentiation – both clinically and in terms of access to treatment. The client gained a clear understanding of the role market events played in shifting access dynamics, helping them anticipate potential threats and opportunities. Findings informed adjustments to access strategy, messaging, and pull-through planning to better align with payer expectations and maintain competitive positioning.
