“Strategies for New Drug Development in Korea”, coauthored by Yoona Choi, Prof. Howard Lee, Jung-Hyun Won, and Yesol Hong, was published on May 16, 2022. In this book, the authors analyzed the current status of new drug development in Korea from three perspectives, each starting with the letter E, i.e., exploration (from discovery to preclinical development), exploitation (clinical development and regulatory approval), and expedition (fast access to new drugs by patients). In this approach, the authors have tried to identify the key areas to improve, and suggested strategies to accelerate new drug development in Korea through a business ecosystem window.

This book aimed to answer following three questions.

The first question the book tries to answer was “Unlike semiconductor, smartphone, and K-Pop, why have Korean new drug development endeavors not worked at its full potential in the global market?” After briefly explaining the processes of new drug development, the book discusses how and why important new drug development is, followed by an in-depth discussion as to what went wrong or derailed in Korea before and why in Korea. The book also summarizes capabilities and resources for each process of new drug development and where Korea is lacking behind.

The second question to answer through the book was “How can Korea improve and accelerate patient access to innovative new drugs?” The book shows how delayed drug approval and reimbursement have been in Korea by comparing the drug approval systems in Korea with those in several developed countries, and by focusing on the inefficiency of the current drug pricing and reimbursement systems in Korea. The authors have proposed several new policies to ‘expedite’ patient access to new drugs in Korea. 

Lastly, the book asks “How can Korea write success stories in drug development?” For this question, the book summarizes first the current status ‘as-is’ and proposes a future as ‘to-be’ from the business ecosystem perspective. The book then discusses how those ‘to-be’s can be accomplished. 

The book is currently available at various off-line and on-line book stores such as Yes24 and Kyobo book.