Mayne Pharma has been around for over 18 years, but over the last couple of years it has been undergoing a transformation, capitalising on its dermatological and women’s health product ranges in the US market.
But that transformation is the result of a dramatic turnaround.
“The company was virtually bankrupt in 2022,” says Shawn O’Brien, CEO of Mayne Pharma. “We sold a major business for $475 million to put money on the balance sheet and pay off our debts, then focused on selling women’s health products and generics.”
It was a strategy that helped change Mayne Pharma’s fortunes, leading the company to $185 million in profits in 2023, and $188 million in the first half of 2024. O’Brien puts this success down to the firm’s commercial operational excellence across two segments of the US market – women’s health and dermatology. But across both segments, it comes down to one thing.
“First and foremost, all my career I have been patient-focused,” O’Brien reveals. “My business approach is that if it works for the patient, it works for us. In women’s health, we have brought in products that appeal to the patient better than the competition. We have got four products in the women’s health segment, including the newest and best birth control pill and ring, the best hormonal therapy for menopausal symptoms, and the best lubricant for vaginal atrophy.”
The Best Platform for the Best Products
Having the best products is only half the battle, however. These best-in-class products are matched with a disciplined approach to how Mayne Pharma markets itself.
“Companies have gone bankrupt in the sector spending too much money on marketing,” says O’Brien. “The market is influenced by the patient, but if you spend too much on advertising directly to the consumer that can create its own problems.”
In the dermatology market, Mayne Pharma has developed a specialised, platform-based approach that offers six proprietary plans to dermatologist practitioners.
“A lot of dermatologists went into practice because they don’t want to be on call, but in the US the payers put them on call. So what we have done is create a new model, alongside patient support services firm InfinityRx,” O’Brien explains. “It uses a prescription discount card system so that when a physician goes to the portal they can find out within 30 seconds how much the out-of-pocket will cost the patient.”
Supporting that platform, Mayne Pharma has also established its own mail-order pharmacy across 50 states, allowing it to bypass wholesalers and get products to patients’ houses within a day or so of ordering.
A Turnaround Transformation
By backing the right products, and putting into place the right infrastructure to get those products to customers, Mayne Pharma has put itself on a strong growth trajectory, but that position hasn’t come easily.
In 2016 Mayne Pharma made a major purchase of another business for approximately half a billion Australian dollars to buy a generics business based in the US. The firm raised $888 million, but shortly after the purchase was completed the US generics market dropped, pricing fell, and the acquisition failed to perform.
“The company had to borrow money to make things work, building up $300 million in debt,” O’Brien says. “It got to the point where cashflow was insufficient to service the debt.”
To kickstart Mayne Pharma’s recovery, the company began investing in a manufacturing facility it had been operating in Greenville for the last ten years, getting it to a point where it could then sell the facility for 16.7 times profitability.
“That improved our balance sheet dramatically,” O’Brien. “It was the only solution we had because our business in Australia was nowhere near as large.”
Having sold this asset, Mayne Pharma used the working capital it had generated to complete an exclusive product licensing transaction with TherapeuticsMD, or TXMD, bringing four of their assets under the Mayne Pharma umbrella to help grow the business alongside its own existing products.
“That gave us critical mass, because it is difficult to be successful as a single product company,” O’Brien shares. “Picking up those three brands gave us the platform and position to grow and roll up other assets in the women’s health market.”
A Women’s Health Company
It is a market that Mayne Pharma has been passionate about serving.
“We want to be seen by patients and providers as the number one name in women’s health,” O’Brien says.
To succeed in that goal, Mayne Pharma has to make sure that it reflects the market it serves.
“You can’t be successful without great people, and I think our people should reflect the customers we serve,” O’Brien tells us. “We have a diversity strategy in the company. One of my first hires when I came on board was to bring in an African American woman to lead our People and Culture Department. She joined in January of 2023 and is leading our people.”
It was a decision O’Brien made based on his experience as a six-time CEO.
“I’ve learned there are only three things I can control,” he says. “The products we bring to the market, the processes we have in place, and the people we have in place to serve the needs of the patients in a profitable manner.”
For O’Brien diversity is not about race or gender, but about bringing a range of experiences to the table.
“My primary objective is to get the right talent and make sure it reflects the customers we serve,” O’Brien shares.
It is not just about bringing people into the company. It is also about investing in and motivating those people to achieve the best results.
“I’ve grown up focused on making people do things that they didn’t think they could do,” O’Brien says. “My dad was a criminal lawyer and he always said that if you never lie you never have to remember anything. So I tell the truth respectfully, and develop people to achieve things they might have thought they could not do.”
Given the kind of turnaround Mayne Pharma has experienced, O’Brien certainly has form for inspiring surprising results.
