Comparative Analysis of Competitive Position of Shire Plc in Various Markets - Essay Example

With around 15 brands operating under the umbrella of Shire Plc, the company has enhanced their marketplace and diversified its business operations (Shire, 2014). Recently Biopharmaceuticals Company AbbVie opted for taking over Shire Plc, and after numerous reconsiderations and deals between both the organisations, the deal was called off. The initial offer of AbbVie was £27.3 billion, which was then increased to $54.8 billion (Bennett and Chen, 2014). However, given the changes in the US Tax Inversion process, AbbVie backed out of the merger process, for which they will have to pay a total of $1.

Shire Plc experienced a steep fall of 27% in its share prices (Yahoo Finance, 2014). 6 billion to Shire Plc as breakup fee. The target market of Shire Plc is patients suffering from behavioural health, gastrointestinal problems and other rare diseases (the Shire, 2014). Shire Plc has also developed a good brand value in the market of regenerative medicines. The target markets selected by Shire Plc hold some of the largest consumer segments in the healthcare and pharmaceutical industry (Angell, 2004).

The interesting fact about the management process of Shire Plc is that all their business success has primarily come from their mergers, acquisitions and alliances (Market Line, 2014). One of the core competencies of the company is the diversity in its customer offerings. The ability to integrate the various cultures with the organisational mission and vision has gained them a unique competitive advantage that provides cost and differentiation advantages over their competitors. However, Shire Plc is still largely dependent on its Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) drugs for generating market revenue. At the same time, other categories such as medicines related to Gastrointestinal or Hereditary Angioedema are still not able to compete with other products of other firms such as Johnson & Johnson and GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) (Badr, Madden and Wright, 2006). Also, it can be observed that despite their extensive strategy for mergers and alliances, the brand equity of Shire Plc is still to be marked in the international market.