Skip to main content

Juul’s CEO Steps Down. But What Comes Next?: Brainstorm Health

Hello and happy hump day, readers.

Perhaps it was inevitable in the face of lawsuits, regulatory crackdowns, reports of horrifying lung illnesses, and a general sense of unease—but Kevin Burns, CEO of the privately-held firm Juul, is stepping down from his perch.

The Juul CEO’s sudden departure is just one chapter in this rapidly unfolding story. Here’s another excerpt: The tobacco giant Altria, which bought a 35% stake in Juul last year at a reported $40 billion valuation, is no longer in talks with Philip Morris International (PMI) to bring the companies together again.

Altria spun off PMI more than a decade ago while holding on to the U.S.-based Philip Morris unit (which controls major brands such as Marlboro in America). PMI has been focused on “heat not burn” tobacco products in international markets (these are not the same things as vapes). The divergent business strategies, and the public health outcry against vaping and e-cigs, almost certainly sunk any potential deal.

But what happens next? Will PMI’s bet on heat-not-burn devices actually pay dividends in the consumer market? And, more importantly, are these devices any better from a public health perspective than the vaping products facing blowback right now?

Read on for the day’s news.

Sy Mukherjee, @the_sy_guy, sayak.mukherjee@fortune.com



from Fortune https://ift.tt/2lgQkGc
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Photo finish: Crashing sales force Olympus to sell iconic camera business

Sometimes, the vicissitudes of capitalism force companies to exit the businesses for which they’re best known. Olympus, once a leading light in the photography industry, is now joining that list. On Wednesday, the company said it planned to quit its 84-year-old camera business. The imaging giant, known for its once-pervasive digital cameras, agreed to sell off the declining unit by year’s end. Japan Industrial Partners, a private equity firm best known for buying Sony’s struggling Vaio computer line in 2014, agreed to purchase the business. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. A glance at Olympus’s financial statements provides all the rationale for the divestiture; as at rival manufacturers, camera sales have plummeted over the past decade. For the fiscal year ended March 31, Olympus’s camera unit declined 10% versus the year prior to  ¥43.6 billion, or $407 million. The unit’s sales have collapsed by three-quarters from a decade ago, when the company brought in ¥175 bill...
Post a Comment
Read more

WHO says common steroids can slash death risk for the sickest coronavirus patients

Our mission to help you navigate the new normal is fueled by subscribers. To enjoy unlimited access to our journalism,  subscribe today . An old drug can learn new tricks during the coronavirus pandemic. That’s the main takeaway from the World Health Organization (WHO) in a new analysis of corticosteroids—a class of drugs which have existed for dozens of years and are far cheaper than new, experimental COVID treatments in development—suggesting that drugs like dexamethasone can slash the chances of COVID-19 related deaths by as much as 35% in the sickest patients. The WHO analysis of coronavirus drugs encompassed seven separate studies. And while an analysis of this sort—what’s called a “meta-analysis”—isn’t as rigorous as other types of trials like a randomized controlled study, the data are compelling. Corticosteroids have a very different action mechanism from many of the other coronavirus drugs in development. COVID-19 is a peculiar disease. Some who have been infected ma...
Post a Comment
Read more