Pfizer’s CEO on leading after a moonshot—and making deals with Trump

That has been Albert Bourla’s reality, post-COVID.

As the CEO of Pfizer, a company he first joined in 1993, Bourla—a veterinarian by training—led the company through the pandemic. His team worked around the clock to deliver products to combat the crisis—Pfizer collaborated with startup BioNTech to bring the first FDA-approved COVID-19 vaccine to market; it also introduced Paxlovid, the first antiviral medicine customized to fight COVID. Business soared to record revenue.

Fast forward to today, and Pfizer has a new set of challenges. It is facing a patent cliff for some of its most lucrative drugs, and the COVID bump that lifted its revenues is over. In 2022, Bourla says, COVID-related revenue soared to more than $56 billion. Today, that revenue sits at around $5 billion.

“At the top of the hill, you are the best company,” Bourla told me during a recent episode of my vodcast, Fortune 500: Titans and Disruptors. “You are named the best CEO. The people at Pfizer are the most proud employees in the world. Suddenly, to have a financial drop, it hurts a lot, and that creates emotional reactions for everyone in the company, including me.”

So Bourla has positioned the company to undertake new moonshots: Pfizer aims to capitalize on other revolutionary drugs like GLP-1s, and turn cancer into a disease that can be, if not always eradicated, then lived with. Bourla, who was raised by a mother who was both a Holocaust survivor and an eternal optimist, remains determined: 

“I do believe that the winners in life are not differentiated from the losers in life because the winners never fall,” he says. “They are differentiated because the winners always stand up again.”

Here are a few of the leadership lessons I took away from our conversation (read the full transcript here):

Bourla’s relationship with President Trump, and how he reached a deal with the administration in 10 days to reduce drug costs for Americans:

“It was very clear to me that what was in his mind in the first administration had now become a very intensive itch that needed to be scratched: He was very adamant that he can’t tolerate that other rich nations pay less than Americans are paying.”

How he won a $10 billion Game of Thrones-like acquisition battle for GLP-1 maker Metsera, besting rival Novo Nordisk:

“I told everyone: ‘That’s it. We are going to get it. Don’t worry.’ My people were devastated … when they saw Novo coming and complicating things that we thought were in our pocket.”

Why the world is less prepared for the next pandemic, and whether authorities made mistakes while fighting COVID:

“I still remember huge trucks with refrigeration that instead of having chickens and beef inside, they had human bodies because we didn’t have anywhere to store them. People have the tendency to forget because it is not the case now, but it’s not the case because of the vaccines and treatments.”

How AI can accelerate drug development to make solutions for diseases like cancer possible in our lifetime:

“I think we should be able to cure [some cancers]. The remaining ones that are not cured will become chronic diseases: You can live with your cancer like you live with your diabetes.”

Listen to the full episode of Fortune 500: Titans and Disruptors of Industry with Bourla on YouTube, Spotify, or Apple Podcasts.—Alyson Shontell

Contact CEO Daily via Diane Brady at [email protected]

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CEO Daily is compiled and edited by Joey Abrams, Claire Zillman and Lee Clifford.