Merck sets stage for a CEO transition — someday

Merck held its first investor day in five years yesterday at swank digs on the Upper East Side. The focus? Proving the company has more to offer than its big cancer drug Keytruda — and that it can thrive whenever CEO Ken Frazier and research chief Roger Perlmutter decide it is time to end their tenures.

Frazier, who seemed to speak as little as possible, repeated that drug development is a team sport and at one point shared the stage with nine other executives.

“Our mission and our rich legacy of inventing to save and improve lives is the foundation of our company, it’s the foundation of everything that we do, and I think more importantly it’s the springboard for our future,” Frazier said. Perlmutter, for his part, told analysts to put down their pens, and gave them a history lesson on Merck’s research laboratories that went back to 1933, before leaving discussion of individual products to his team.

Who could succeed Frazier? The obvious contenders: CFO Robert Davis, Chief Commercial Officer Frank Clyburn, and Chief Marketing Officer Mike Nally. All of them got a chance to show off their stuff. When asked afterward who could replace him after the event, Perlmutter said: “Most of them are upstairs,” referring to the Merck researchers who had been on stage.