Brian Reid
Managing Director
W2O Group
Uncovering the Story on Pricing
Three years ago, it became clear the pharmaceutical industry had a product-pricing challenge. Increasing scrutiny made it critical to prepare for attention around pricing from different stakeholders with diverse views. That sparked Brian Reid to build a data-first approach to communications about medication pricing, leading to the foundation of W2O’s Value and Access offering to provide counsel around pricing, access, and reimbursement.
He created an analytics tool that crunches 31 different variables to create a risk assessment for five different audiences. Brian and his team also created a media database that has logged thousands of products and spokespeople, which fuels the Value Report, a weekly analysis of pricing and value news that has a circulation of more than 1,000.
This is where Brian’s background in journalism comes in handy. He started his career at Bloomberg News, where he covered medical science and the FDA for five years. He was a founding editor of Health-IT World, an award-winning email newsletter. And his online work has been noted by Wired.com, the Wall Street Journal, and the Boston Globe, among others. Prior to joining W2O, Brian worked at the National Institutes of Health, where he wrote and produced patient education content for one of the Institutes.
In addition to overseeing production on W2O’s Value Report, he also recently launched “Redeeming Value,” a podcast on value and access. “Brian is rara avis in the communications world,” exclaims Javier Boix, Head of U.S. Public Affairs, AbbVie. “His balanced, sharp, insightful, and incisive style is much needed in a healthcare world that is full of opportunities and challenges.”
Now, as Managing Director of Healthcare at W2O Group, he provides high-level strategic media relations and issues management counsel, specializing in multiple disease areas including oncology, inflammatory diseases, and pain. For instance, Brian and his team partnered with the National Pharmaceutical Council to launch a new campaign, “Going Below the Surface,” to explore the better ways of understanding what society receives for its investment in healthcare and where those dollars are spent well and spend poorly.
