why do bigger firms receive faster drug approvals daniel carpenter brian feinstein colin moore marc turenne ian yohai evan james zucker may 2004 abstract we test several explanations for the commonly observed pattern that larger shorter fda approval times drugs they submit candidate include capture and rent seeking external signals accounts analyses of 766 new molecular entities submitted to from 1979 2000 suggest large firm advantage in pharmaceutical regulation is primarily due two factors 1 enhanced regulator familiarity with by virtue their submission histories an effect augmented when merge 2 regulatory favor early entrants a disease market which induced specific consumer pressure our show as much 70 expected can be attributed these 30 55 alone find no consistent support or political clout note department government harvard university cambridge massachusetts michigan ann arbor medical school boston corresponding author e mail dcarpenter latte edu thanks national science foundation ses 0047862
