Interview: Eli Lilly CEO David Ricks embraces America's "golden era" by investing billions at home, discusses MAHA, and more

THE LOWDOWN:

• Pharma giant Eli Lilly and Company CEO Dave Ricks said the company is “more than doubling” it’s previous $23 billion of investments in America.

• Beyond pouring tens of billions of dollars directly into America, Ricks said that his company’s “main priority is to keep our discovery engine rolling, make important medicines, and get them produced at scale.”

• While many in the pharmaceutical industry were unfamiliar with Trump before his first term, Ricks said the industry is having “very good” conversations with Trump and with Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., this time.

• In order to combat America’s obesity epidemic, Ricks called for an “all of the above strategy,” adding that “to us, it's one of the most important things we could do.”

Eli Lilly and Company, the American pharmaceutical giant, is ready for what both its CEO and President Donald Trump, have called the “golden” era of American innovation. Fresh off of announcing the “largest rollout of a production plan for our industry in history,” Lilly’s CEO Dave Ricks spoke with the Washington Reporter about his conversations with the Trump administration, the importance of both securing our border and in competing with China, and what the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement looks like.

Ricks joined up with senior Trump administration officials, including Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, and top Senate Republicans like Sen. Todd Young (R., Ind.) to announce that Lilly is “more than doubling” its previous $23 billion of investments in America, as first covered by the Reporter.

“Importantly, [we’re] building four new sites in to be determined locations in the U.S.,” he said. “This is the largest single company action ever taken, and will, in total, be $50 billion in nine new factories.”

Beyond pouring tens of billions of dollars directly into America, Ricks said that his company’s “main priority is to keep our discovery engine rolling, make important medicines, and get them produced at scale.” Ricks added that another priority is “the renewal of the tax program that was put in place in 2017.”

“You may have noticed that last week that we had a big announcement on production — we need that corporate tax rate to be competitive with Europe and other jurisdictions to lure that investment back home,” Ricks said.

When it comes to Ricks’s industry specifically, he noted that he is “really looking at PBM reform and seeing if we can take down list prices in the U.S. and have a more rational system for consumers, but also for everyone else in the middle of the equation.

“Right now, there's just too much opaque pricing and profit taking,” he added.

While many in the pharmaceutical industry were unfamiliar with Trump before his first term, Ricks said the industry is having “very good” conversations with Trump and with Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., this time.

“The president and the industry got to know each other pretty well in his first term,” he said. “That wasn't the case coming in; he obviously was a businessman and a real estate guy. But through COVID and so forth, I think the mutual appreciation grew and we were able to get things done, to get the vaccines approved. So that's carried over, and I think we try to press upon the economic advisors, and the rest of the White House the importance of the industry to our country, not just the economic part, which is significant. We employ over 2 million people and are a meaningful export business, but also for security back home, for the supply chain, for medical products, etc., which is an important issue, and we get into that vis a vis China.”

“With Kennedy and with the MAHA movement, at the top level, we have a huge amount of alignment. Everyone in our company wakes up every day trying to make people healthy. So that's important. I think what we need to embrace as an industry is the idea that medicine isn't always the answer. Science tells us that already, so that's easy to embrace. And on the other hand, sometimes lifestyle and prevention isn't enough, and we need medicine. And I think when we've been able to focus on that, there's just a lot of alignment with what Secretary Kennedy is trying to get done, and if we can improve obesity rates, if we improve the health of Americans, that's a powerful mission. We want to be a part of that.”

In order to combat America’s obesity epidemic, Ricks called for an “all of the above strategy,” adding that “to us, it's one of the most important things we could do.”

“Our job is to make them work with the administration and insurance companies to make [weight loss drugs] more available and at lower cost. And we're committed to do that,” he said, adding that “we have many more coming.”

Lilly’s work in that realm mirrors Trump’s desire to invest in America, with Ricks saying the company is "making up factories to do this at scale.”

“And I think for the first time in my career, we could say, through lifestyle intervention and medicine, we could make this national crisis, which is driving 40 percent of our health care costs, a distant memory, and that's our goal,” he added.

During his interview with the Reporter, Ricks stressed repeated areas of cooperation with the Trump administration and faulted the previous administration for how it allowed an open border that saw untested and unapproved drugs from China and from Mexico to flow into America. Ricks said this issue “really has blossomed and grown in a way that's really quite concerning.”

“Of course, Americans know about the fentanyl issues,” Ricks said. “That's the illegal drug, although it's also a prescription drug. And we are now working hard to eliminate the flow of that for the weight loss drugs we make. And just to give you a sense: there may be up to one or two million Americans using these so-called drugs. They're not actually proven. Most of them are sourced out of Chinese labs that aren't even approved in China, let alone in the U.S. And they're injecting these substances into their body. It's a little frightening. Every day we get calls from poison control centers. We test this material often. It's not even close to the medicine we make.”

Securing the border “and policing the food and drug system is really the job of the federal government. That's one of our asks of the [this] administration,” he said, allowing the problem “to grow…was a huge, huge mistake, and we should stop it, he said.”

Below is a transcript of our interview with Eli Lilly CEO Dave Ricks, lightly edited for clarity.

Washington Reporter:

What are your top priorities as Eli Lily CEO as we head into this second Trump term?

Dave Ricks:

In general, our priorities are to make medicine for bad diseases, and that's how we create value for people. Right now, it's really a kind of a golden era. I know that's a phrase being used for medical discovery, and one example that is the work we've done in tackling the obesity crisis, another is our work with Alzheimer's disease. There are other targets we have, and so the main priority we have is to keep our discovery engine rolling, make important medicines, and get them produced at scale. Specifically to the U.S. right now, the policy priorities are ones that you'll hear from our industry a lot. One key one for us is the renewal of the tax program that was put in in 2017. You may have noticed that last week that we had a big announcement on production; we need that corporate tax rate to be competitive with Europe and other jurisdictions to lure that investment back home. So that's a key one for me. And then there's one industry one as well, which is really looking at PBM reform and seeing if we can take down list prices in the U.S. and have a more rational system for consumers, but also for everyone else in the middle of the equation. Right now, there's just too much opaque pricing and profit taking. So those are our two top priorities.

Washington Reporter:

You just mentioned the $50 billion investment into the American economy. Tell us about what that looked like from your end, and how that happened, and what is that? How does that fit in with the priorities you were just laying out?

Dave Ricks:

That's the execution part. Going back to just the first term, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act was passed, and we hadn't built a new facility in the U.S. in 40 years. And the equation changed completely there to get the corporate rate down to 21 percent, maybe even going lower now. It really incentivizes domestic investment and production. So based on the success of Mounjaro and Zepbound, along with other pipeline products, we started construction on a new site just at the end of the first Trump presidency. We're now into our fifth one. By the way, these take about four years to build and be approved and so forth. We have committed so far $23 billion. So last week's announcement was more than doubling that, and importantly, building four new sites in to be determined locations in the U.S. This is the largest rollout of a production plan for our industry in history. This is the largest single company action ever taken, and will, in total, be $50 billion in nine new factories.

Washington Reporter:

You have already met with President Trump and with his new Health and Human Services Secretary, Robert Kennedy; tell us about those discussions and what's their reception towards you been?

Dave Ricks:

I think overall, very good. The president and the industry got to know each other pretty well in his first term. That wasn't the case coming in; he obviously was a businessman and a real estate guy. But through COVID and so forth, I think the mutual appreciation grew and we were able to get things done, to get the vaccines approved. So that's carried over, and I think we try to press upon the economic advisors, and the rest of the White House the importance of the industry to our country, not just the economic part, which is significant. We employ over 2 million people and are a meaningful export business, but also for security back home, for the supply chain, for medical products, etc., which is an important issue, and we get into that vis a vis China. With Kennedy and with the MAHA movement, at the top level, we have a huge amount of alignment. Everyone in our company wakes up every day trying to make people healthy. So that's important. I think what we need to embrace as an industry is the idea that medicine isn't always the answer. Science tells us that already, so that's easy to embrace. And on the other hand, sometimes lifestyle and prevention isn't enough, and we need medicine. And I think when we've been able to focus on that, there's just a lot of alignment with what Secretary Kennedy is trying to get done, and if we can improve obesity rates, if we improve the health of Americans, that's a powerful mission. We want to be a part of that.

Washington Reporter:

You were just alluding to the counterfeit drugs and ingredients from who knows where that are still pouring into America from China through Mexico. Can you talk about this from your standpoint as a CEO of pharmaceutical company, and about the damage that this does? What are the concerns here and how can it be stopped?

Dave Ricks:

It really has blossomed and grown in a way that's that's really quite concerning. Of course, Americans know about the fentanyl issues. That's the illegal drug, although it's also a prescription drug. And we are now working hard to eliminate the flow of that for the weight loss drugs we make. And just to give you a sense: there may be up to one or two million Americans using these so-called drugs. They're not actually proven. Most of them are sourced out of Chinese labs that aren't even approved in China, let alone in the U.S. And they're injecting these substances into their body. It's a little frightening. Every day we get calls from poison control centers. We test this material often. It's not even close to the medicine we make. This was allowed to grow in the last three years under the last administration. That was a huge, huge mistake, and we should stop it. We're now in a good supply position, which was the loophole used that these guys exploited to profit on Americans, and kind of their lack of knowledge about how the FDA-approved medicines work. But we need help in the government, because controlling the border and policing the food and drug system is really the job of the federal government. That's one of our asks of the incoming administration, too.

Washington Reporter:

You had already mentioned the Make America Healthy Again movement that Secretary Kennedy really kicked off. And you mentioned that medicine isn't always the answer, but how do you look at the obesity crisis? From your standpoint, where do you fit in? How can America tackle that?

Dave Ricks:

To us, it's one of the most important things we could do. We need an all of the above strategy. We've spoken to the Secretary as well as to others on his team, and that starts with healthy living choices and with food, in particular for children, that area is something that we would support greatly. The science tells us, though, that if people have been overweight or obese for most of their adult life, reducing it without the help of medicine is really difficult for most, so we need a strategy that embraces that as well. Our job is to make them work with the administration and insurance companies to make them more available and at lower cost. And we're committed to do that. And just pointing out here, Lily is the company that invented the best selling one right now. We have many more coming. We're doing this in America. We're making up factories to do this at scale. And I think for the first time in my career, we could say, through lifestyle intervention and medicine, we could make this national crisis, which is driving 40 percent of our health care costs, a distant memory, and that's our goal.

Washington Reporter:

Given both Trump's priorities and the priorities that you were laying out, what other opportunities do you see to work with the Trump administration on furthering American pharmaceutical leadership?

Dave Ricks:

Helping out gaining value abroad is one of the key topics we discussed in our meeting recently. We need to own part of this in industry. Obviously, there's price differences in developed countries from the U.S. And one of the reasons for that is that we're not in a real negotiation there. The government's dictating our price abroad. And often we accept that your choice is to not sell a product. So we need trade tools to overcome that. That's a company to government discussion that we're never going to win, but a government to government discussion, we could win. So that would be a trade policy issue for the incoming U.S. Trade Representative and the White House. We need their help with this. The second is really to embrace the moment right now. As I said, we're in a golden age of medical discovery, but we're sort of in the dark ages of medical reimbursement, and a strategy to change for the better, both life expectancy in our country, but also the trajectory of spending. We're spending way too much on acute diseases that were caused by actions years ago. We need to move to prevention and move to technology, which is both medical technology as well as information technologies, so that people can have the tools to help themselves. I think if we can make that pivot in the next four years, the idea of MAHA or Making America Healthy Again, could be a reality, but we need to also, in addition to talking about the right things to do, we need to move the resources in the system. So that's a big idea, but I think this could be a moment to do that, where we could imagine something like conquering obesity. I think that we have the tools already to do that. We need to just rearrange the resources. We need to have coverage at the national level for employers and the government, and we need to have the prevention strategies. But we're also working on a similar thing for preventing Alzheimer's. Will we embrace that? I don't know. Right now, the easiest thing develop products for or charge the government services for, are acute illness, and that seems like really a mismatch between the goals we should have and where the resources are going.

Washington Reporter:

I didn't watch the Oscars, but Eli Lilly ran another ad campaign about promoting this healthy skepticism, in the words of the ad, towards these non-FDA approved medicines. Can you talk about that strategy of non-traditional outreach? And what else you think comes next towards that healthy skepticism towards these types of treatments that people are taking?

Dave Ricks:

I'm glad you noticed that. Since last year, we really started a corporate campaign to really talk about what the company does at a company level, and take a point of view on controversial issues, but ones we really believe in, and during the Oscars we ran a campaign to talk about the question you asked earlier, which is that people are pursuing improvement in their health, but there's a scientifically-based way to go about developing health products. People should educate themselves on that. And if things seem too good to be true, they probably are. And unfortunately, lots of people are spending time and money online with really questionable things, including, as you mentioned earlier, illegally imported and fake medicine. And so part of the MAHA movement that's interesting is people wanting to take charge of their own decision making in health. And I think what we're saying here is we think that's awesome, that people should investigate. They should read about the science. They should be skeptical about claims that seem over the top or illegitimate, but in doing so, we cannot embrace a world of totally unregulated, non-transparent source of medicines because it's cheap or sounds good. That's not the way. And so in our business, because it's a science process, we're skeptical of everything until proven and repeated results are done in a controlled way. This is the start of educating the public on how science works and why it's great to be a healthy skeptic.

Washington Reporter:

Thanks so much for chatting, Dave, and thanks for investing billions in America.