ABSTRACT

This question is the most fundamental of all those that any organisation can ask itself. None of the other questions can be answered until this one has been resolved. The question itself rests on two premises that fl ow from the research described in Part 3 . First, the landscape occupied by the life sciences industry is fragmenting into many different fi tness peaks, each of which demands a business model with different routines, capabilities and traits. Second, it is either impossible or unwise for a single organisation to maintain every business model, so that choosing between them is a necessary prerequisite to answering all of the other questions, which concern how to build the chosen model or models.