Mediterranean hegemon

Everyone immediately became excited. Although for the size of the United Group, a price-earnings ratio of 25 times and a price-to-book ratio of 2.5 times are not very cheap, but at least it is still below the market average. More importantly, it still retains the bond qualification. Starting from July 1929, it will be opened at the point of annual principal and interest repayment within 5 years. This situation of advancing to attack and retreating to defend, coupled with the joint guarantee of United Group's mortgage of other listed shares, makes Journalists believed that the interests of investors were taken care of to the greatest extent.

Of course, the United Group itself also makes a lot of money: reducing the current financing cost of about 4.5% to 1.5% will reduce the financing interest by three points every year and save US$100 million in financing costs a year.

"Third, United Medicine's first innovative and epoch-making antibacterial drug has passed hospital clinical verification and FDA evaluation and approval, and will be fully sold across the United States. This will help save the lives of thousands of patients. This The name of this drug is sulfonamide. Now I would like to ask the inventor of this drug, Mr. Gerhard Domak, to give you a detailed description of its working principle and its value.”

Although "drugs" were rampant in the late 19th century, real doctors knew very well that only quinine, aspirin, and morphine had some effect. Others could only wait for the patient to recover on his own. In this case, Everyone is frantically looking for drugs that can fight bacteria. Paul Ehrlich was the first to achieve limited success and found 606 (arsenophenamine) to effectively treat syphilis, thus ushering in the era of chemical treatment. However, 606 The side effects were severe, and it could only treat syphilis, so chemists continued to rush in, and one of them was a lucky man named Domac.

As a medical student, he was injured in World War I and then became a "medic", witnessing numerous wound infections, especially gas gangrene, that left doctors with no choice but to cut and cut. Perhaps feeling the doctor's powerlessness, Domac set his mind to engage in scientific research and vowed to find a drug to treat germs. But the fledgling "scientific research dog" was so poor that he didn't even have the courage to propose to his girlfriend of nine years, and it wasn't until he survived the second disaster that he decided to get married.

After marriage, he balanced work and life. He found a job in a university pathology department and continued his research on bacteria, immunity, and pathology. At the same time, he gave birth to three children, but his life was as tight as ever, but he was lucky. But he began to favor him, and the president came to visit him. At that time, Contini was searching for unsatisfied talents in various fields in German universities, and offered higher salaries than those in Germany. Many people went to work in Italy, and Domac also followed. Waves of people arrived in Italy.

Originally, his ambition was to find a job in the Department of Medicine to support his family, and to engage in scientific research if there were still conditions, so he clearly stated this in his job application. As expected, he got a teaching position and was assigned to Work at the Medical College of Rome. But it was such a coincidence that this was also the school where Ada studied. Contini met Domac when he was looking for Ada. Like countless speculators, he recognized Contini and flew to the flames like a moth. 99% of adventurers will be driven away by bodyguards when they rush to introduce their research ideas, hoping to be recognized, because Contini will know whether their "invention" is reliable or not as soon as they hear it, but Domac is the lucky 1%. , he talked about his ideals and described the fact that he operated on streptococci. Anyway, the president was waiting for his girlfriend to get out of class, so he was idle.

In this era, streptococcal infections are common and fatal. Once conquered, there will be broad market prospects. But there are many types of Streptococcus, and there are differences in pathogenicity between species. It is impossible to try every type of Streptococcus? On this issue, Domac made a decisive choice: No matter how many types of streptococci there are, I want the most poisonous one! He collected samples from patients who died of streptococcal infection, cultured and isolated them and then infected mice, hoping to find a strain with 100% infection and fatality rate. Only indiscriminate infection and death can be called the "most virulent strain". ". After several months of hard work, before he talked to Contini, he had found a strain that could still kill all vaccinated mice within two or three days after diluting the culture medium 100,000 times. This led to the successful establishment of an animal model of streptococcal infection.

Contini's first impression was that he could develop bacterial weapons, but later he felt that something was wrong. This method was too troublesome and too costly. He should look for drug treatment in the opposite direction, so he blurted out: "You can try penicillin, even if there is no penicillin. You can also use sulfa, which is said to be effective against streptococci..."

Now it was Domac's turn to be dumbfounded: "What is penicillin? What is sulfonamide?"

Contini then remembered that in this era, "penicillin" had not yet been found, and "sulfa" had not been invented at all. He knew that penicillin was Fleming, but he couldn't figure out where sulfa came from, so he finally managed it hesitantly. Well, he just said that there are many people like Domac, and they look like liars in all kinds of ways, and he is not sure whether he can succeed or not.

But within a few days, Mark came over excitedly and said that he had found the patent for sulfonamide. This thing had been patented 18 years ago, but it had no effect at all and was lying there quietly getting moldy. He was here to When asked how the president knew and what to do next, Domac did not dare to test it rashly. He thought that sulfonamide was just an intermediate product or raw material, and there must be other industrial processes.

At this time, Contini was able to fully recall the entire incident: In history, it was Domac who connected azo dyes and sulfonamides together, thus giving birth to the first antibacterial drug prontosil! So he immediately ordered Domac to suspend classes to conduct experiments, and hinted that he could boldly try it on patients. If someone died, he would be responsible for it, so he would just lose some money!

With the president's guarantee and good test conditions, Domac took action boldly. This time, sulfonamide did not need the intermediate chemical dye, and Domac's daughter was not required to undertake the test. He directly obtained the method to defeat streptococcus from Sulfonamide. Secret recipe.

What's more, the sulfonamide patent is about to expire soon. Since it has been in a state of neglect, the original patent owner transferred it to the United Laboratory at a very cheap price. Under the activities of the United Group, the German Patent Office On the grounds of new applications of the original patent, it was agreed to extend the patent protection period for another five years, forming a 20+5 pattern. That is, by 1933, United Group could guarantee the exclusivity of the sulfonamide patent, which laid the foundation for the establishment of United Pharmaceuticals. In Contini's view, these five years are crucial. Five more years will be enough for the United Group to explore the follow-up of sulfa drugs while waiting for penicillin to mature.

In order to respect history, Contini still named the trade name of sulfa drugs as Bailangduoxi! After being registered with the US FDA, it means that the European and American powers have completely opened up here. Of course, Bailangduoxi has nothing to do with Germany's Bayer now.

"This medicine is priced at US$9.99 per box. It can be widely used for infections caused by streptococcus and has specific effects. It will be sold to the public starting tomorrow. To express our respect for the American people, we have prepared 1,000 charity places for Information about patients from poor families is completely free!”

Everyone began to applaud enthusiastically.

In fact, United Pharmaceuticals’ production costs are very low, with each box costing less than US$1 (including the costs of research and development, registration, promotion, and testing). This first batch of drugs was mass-produced and shipped from Italy on a cruise ship a few days ago. In order to cause a sensation, Domac felt that the price was a bit high, but Contini convinced him: "Your project is successful, but how many projects are being studied in the joint laboratory? Every year I It requires a large investment and a large number of manpower to be hired. The success rate is only 2-3%. These funds can only be supported by successful projects, so it is understandable to set the price a little higher. Furthermore, the patent period of this product is only 5 years. Once the patent expires, although we can continue to sell it, I can guarantee that there will be a large number of imitations. At that time, we will only be able to make a normal profit, and you have to consider your business demands. "

Domac was immediately convinced. The entire scientific research team has done a lot of work on this drug. The president provided good conditions for this drug before it was even released. Now that it has just been invented and the market effect has not yet been seen, the president has already transferred the drug to United Real Estate. Large apartments and cars have been delivered. From the other party's standpoint, we must fully consider it.

Now the scientific research team is waiting for the option to be realized. Contini said that United Pharmaceuticals is considering 192. If it succeeds, every team member may become a millionaire. Thinking of the time when he was so poor that he didn't even dare to propose marriage, Domac couldn't help but feel that all the hardships are rewarded. , now he is thinking about another sentence from Contini: What exactly is penicillin? Also, who said this to the CEO? This is either a crazy experiment and a desperate lunatic. Domac knows that there are many scientific research experts who dare to test anything in order to develop drugs, whether it is life or safety. Regardless of everything, he is in a completely crazy state, or he is an unparalleled genius, similar to Tesla, and he really wants to get to know him!

Contini, who had a severe headache, spent countless words to convince the other person that this was mentioned by an inventor when he was chatting with him. He saw so many people every day that he couldn't remember who the other person was. But Domac did believe it, because there were too many people looking for Contini, and if he hadn't been very lucky that day, he would have been taken out by the bodyguards. In fact, the joint laboratory has a special process for processing letters of such inventions. The summarized information will be read by Contini and the president's office. Many projects can eventually become key research projects of the joint laboratory, similar to pvc, Successful waves are an inevitable result under scientific guidance.

Contini concluded: "The success of Bailangduoxi will promote the listing of United Pharmaceuticals. I look forward to sharing the happiness of corporate growth and national development with millions of investors in the United States! If the United States is good, Italy is good, and Italy is good. , then the United Group is good, and vice versa! Long live the great friendship between Italy and Italy!”