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In February 2014, Michael Schrader, chief executive of Vaxess Technologies, Inc., was assessing the startup health care company’s 2014 marketing plan. On December 31st, 2013, Vaxess had obtained an exclusive license to a series of patents for a…

In 2012, over 750 million people around the globe lacked access to safe drinking water. Dean Kamen, inventor of the Segway, sought to bring fresh water to poor and rural areas with the Slingshot, a water purification device. Kamen’s challenge was…

Since founding CancerScan in 2008, Jun Fukuyoshi and Yoshiki Ishikawa had helped to improve cancer screening rates in Japan. Between 2005 and 2007, awareness of breast cancer in Japan rose from 55% to 70%, but the incidence of breast cancer screenings…

On November 22, 2013, the direct-to-consumer genetic testing provider, 23andMe, received a letter from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) ordering the company to halt the sale and promotion of its genetic testing kit. The FDA stated that the…

In 2014, Pfizer proposed a friendly acquisition of AstraZeneca, but the AstraZeneca board resisted over price and strategy concerns. Was this good for pharmaceutical consumers? Pfizer, like pharmaceutical companies in general, faced difficulties in…