2009 M&A/Alliances DOTY Nominee: GSK/UCB

It's time for the IN VIVO Blog's Second Annual Deal of the Year! competition. This year we're presenting awards in three categories--that's 300% more fake prizes than last year!--to highlight the most interesting and creative deal making solutions of the year. The categories are: Big Pharma Deal of the Year, M&A/Alliance Deal of the Year, and Exit/Financing Deal of the Year. We'll supply the nominations (roughly half a dozen in each category throughout December) and you, the voting public, will decide the winners (by voting early and often, commencing once we've announced all the nominees). Strap yourselves in, it's The Race for the Roger™.


OK, it involves some far away places we never think of – even beyond the fabled BRIC countries. But the January deal in which GSK paid UCB $670 million for commercial operations in more than 50 non-core countries, as well as rights to sell some primary care drugs in those territories, could be the IT deal of 2009.

After all, it captures so many of 2009's biggest trends: the land grab in emerging markets, the tug of regionalization versus globalization, the ongoing shake up in primary care, and diversification--the bluster of the big versus the commitment of the focused.

On one level, the deal shows how two companies with very different strategies are reacting to the mania about emerging markets. GSK is looking to be a geographically diversified global provider of medicines at all price points to as many countries as possible—and says its far-flung infrastructure, deep pockets, and global expertise make it the go-to company for late-stage deal-making in emerging markets. In other words, it can be a Big Brother.

UCB, on the other hand, is concentrating on what it does best: it is in effect taking a "master craftsman" approach. At a fraction of the size of GSK or other Big Pharma, it can't be everywhere selling everything. And so, it is joining a small, but important group of biopharma—including the much bigger Bristol-Myers Squibb and Lilly—that has chosen to intensify its focus rather than diversify. It recently repositioned itself as a spec pharma focused on CNS and inflammatory diseases and is extending that idea globally.

GSK's funds enable UCB to pay down its burdensome debt by shedding non-core assets—which were attractive enough for GSK to pay nearly 4X sales. UCB is not giving up on emerging markets, by any means, and still plans to sell specialty drugs in the BRIC countries, along with Mexico, Canada and South Korea. But it won't be stuck with infrastructure or products it can't afford.

GSK is another matter. Even as it cuts expenses in its Western markets, it is bulking up in emerging markets, where antiquated Western terms like "sales force arms race" and "shortage of human capital" –are real business concerns, not just pleasant reminders of the now-gone good old days in the West.

And that strategy is based on fortifying its product portfolio with a series of deals in the mature products and primary care sectors of the pharma industry; the assets UCB sold to GSK include rights to the anti-epileptic Keppra and the allergy drugs Zyrec and Xyzal in certain countries in Africa, the Middle East, the Asia Pacific region and Latin America.

GSK is being ultra-aggressive: along with Sanofi it's been a high-profile deal maker in emerging markets in 2009. Pre -2009, GSK was a player in four of the 10 fastest-growing therapeutic areas in the Middle East and North Africa. Now, the company is in nine of the top 10 therapeutic areas in those countries—a stat it's been communicating as it circles the globe for partners.

Eventually, it expects doors in emerging countries to open for its novel, proprietary specialty drugs. Meanwhile, it, like others, is making hits of some of primary care drugs that are flailing back home, for in emerging markets, primary care drugs still have good value. Hard to believe, but GSK's second largest product in emerging markets is the antibiotic Augmentin, which is growing 30% a year, even as it faces competition from 15-20 generics--people there are so eager for quality, they're willing to pay more out of pocket for branded, proprietary drugs, despite generic alternatives. Now that's a market worthy of a land-grab, and a deal worthy of IVB's Deal of the Year.

image from flickr user mondayne used under a creative commons license.

2009 M&A/Alliances DOTY Nominee: Astellas/Medivation

It's time for the IN VIVO Blog's Second Annual Deal of the Year! competition. This year we're presenting awards in three categories--that's 300% more fake prizes than last year!--to highlight the most interesting and creative deal making solutions of the year. The categories are: Big Pharma Deal of the Year, M&A/Alliance Deal of the Year, and Exit/Financing Deal of the Year. We'll supply the nominations (roughly half a dozen in each category throughout December) and you, the voting public, will decide the winners (by voting early and often, commencing once we've announced all the nominees). Strap yourselves in, it's The Race for the Roger™.


Options, Schmoptions. Sure GSK can ink its low-money-down, risk-hedging deals--for now. We'd argue that with pipelines flagging and the general push to look outside, the hottest targets/assets/technologies are still commanding value in competitive auction arrangements, a place where pesky options tend to be problematic. Yep, that's right. Despite the lackluster economy and the biotech financial crisis, it can be a seller's market.

Just ask Medivation. In late October the company announced a tie-up with Astellas to develop its Phase III prostate cancer drug, MDV3100 in a transaction worth $110 million up-front and biobucks of more than $650 million. Moreover, Medivation still keeps significant control of the development program--at least in the US, where the two firms evenly split costs. (Ex-US, Astellas picks up the whole tab for development and commercialization, providing tiered double-digit royalties in exchange for the privilege.)

Why does this deal merit top marks in the M&A/Alliance race? It's not because the upfront topped the chart in terms of dollar amounts. (That distinction goes to the AstraZeneca/ Targacept alliance announced last week.) But it does highlight the kind of deal you can ink when your target is hot-hot-hot. MDV3100 is one of two late-stage compounds seeking approval to treat hormone-refractory prostate cancer. The other? Abiraterone, a Phase III molecule that was J&J's primary interest for taking out its developer, Cougar Biotechnology, in a deal worth roughly $1 billion.

Other reasons to vote for this deal? Cuz Astellas may be "the new little engine that could" of deal-making. When you're Pfizer or GSK or J&J, a product like MDV3100 isn't by itself going to move the needle when it comes to growing the business. But for Astellas this is an important product that builds upon an existing urology franchise--the pharma sells Flomax and Vesicare--and helps create a new presence in oncology. And to get access, the Japanese player was willing to share the wealth with Medivation.

2009 may have been the year of the mega-merger, but smaller companies like Astellas--and the other Japanese pharmas Takeda, Shionogi, Daiichi, Otsuka, and Eisai--are still finding ways to compete. (Other interesting Astellas deals to note: partnerships with Zogenix, NeurogesX, and a joint-venture with Maxygen.) A lot of the draw comes down to one simple fact: a company's willingness to do right by its partner, including an ability to be flexible on the deal structure. (The BMS-Otuska deal is another interesting example of two partners working to find a structure that mutually benefits both.)

But there's also a willingness to play in risky markets like cardiovascular disease and be bold in the process. Recall Astellas tried--and ultimately failed--to acquire CV Therapeutics before it was outbid by Gilead. We think the company's hostile offer was a watershed moment, showing business as usual for the Japanese pharma didn't necessarily have to mean a consensus driven process. And we give Astellas credit for not being drawn into a bidding war, sticking to its price even after Gilead launched its white knight, higher offer.

So vote for Astellas/Medivation: a vote for oncology drug deals, a vote for increasing alliance values, a vote for the continued strength of the Japanese deal makers.

2009 Big Pharma DOTY Nominee: Pfizer/Wyeth

It's time for the IN VIVO Blog's Second Annual Deal of the Year! competition. This year we're presenting awards in three categories--that's 300% more fake prizes than last year!--to highlight the most interesting and creative deal making solutions of the year. The categories are: Big Pharma Deal of the Year, M&A/Alliance Deal of the Year, and Exit/Financing Deal of the Year. We'll supply the nominations (roughly half a dozen in each category throughout December) and you, the voting public, will decide the winners (by voting early and often, commencing once we've announced all the nominees). Strap yourselves in, it's The Race for the Roger™.
This, surely, is The One. Whether or not you agree with Jeff Kindler's strategy for Pfizer (plenty don't), the $68 billion Wyeth acquisition, announced on January 26, has to be the most obvious candidate for Big Pharma Deal of the Year.

Are we saying it's 2009's "most interesting and creative" deal making solution, in line with what these illustrious award nominations are supposedly rooting out? Creative, no. It was another, even-more-mega, mega-merger that cynics saw as a means to mitigate the impact of Lipitor's genericization. Solution? Too early to say. But what the deal perhaps lacked in creativity--at least, at first sight--it surely made up for in interest.

For this is the deal that marked the beginning of a new kind of Big Pharma. For better or for worse, it turns Pfizer from an R&D-focused, high-risk, high-reward company into a diversified, industrialized group whose investment appeal is less about growth than about dividends, efficiency and value.

In its scale, the transaction symbolized the scope of Pfizer's--and other Big Pharma's--challenges, and in its content, it captured--in one fell swoop--many of the individual strategies drug firms are pursuing in order to escape from their R&D productivity problems. The deal furnished Pfizer with biologicals--supposedly faster-to-develop, easier-to-protect than small molecules--and thus with a chance to compete in the much-vaunted biosimilars opportunity, too, which management is beginning to talk up. The deal also provided vaccines, once a dowdy corner of health care but now Big Pharmas' ticket to good government relations, emerging market access and--exemplified by the ongoing swine 'flu outbreak--pumped up revenues.

And Wyeth brought to Pfizer a significant consumer business (not as big as the one Pfizer sold to J&J only a few years ago, but still ...) thereby offering access to non-Western markets, and, as importantly, to a new, lower-cost range of products.

And that's the point: Pfizer has decided its only way to survive is by providing a far wider range of medicines, at a range of price-points, across a range of markets. What it sorely lacks in innovative R&D output it will make up in breadth-of-offering, economies of scale and lower costs. As a senior Pfizer source was quoted in this IN VIVO feature:

"The way to deliver earnings growth isn't what we did in the go-go days of the '90s, but rather, it's emulating what the consumer package goods companies, Coke, Pepsi, Procter & Gamble did. There was never great top-line growth there--3-8%. But if you grow your expense line at a much slower rate you can still achieve double-digit bottom-line growth--a predictable 10-13%."

All that makes sense, surely, in a payer-constrained world with increasing generics and where most future growth is predicted to come from generic- and OTC-dominated developing markets like China.

Maybe. But, you ask, isn't Pfizer chickening out of blue-sky R&D? If it's not the end of the story it's certainly the end of the chapter on blockbuster, primary care drugs. Pfizer isn't giving up internal R&D, but it's definitely demoting it, betting that purchases can fill the gaps. And it's betting, too, that it can create the kind of small-unit creativity within its far-larger walls that GlaxoSmithKline has so vocally advocated.

The deal's critics say Pfizer should have gotten smaller, not larger. It should have followed Bristol. Pfizer considered shrinking, and spin-offs, according to strategy SVP Bill Ringo. Too complicated and risky, he and his colleagues concluded.

But far from choosing the easy option, it's arguable that buying Wyeth was equally, if not more, risky. Even following the R&D re-org, headcount cuts and a 35% reduction in global R&D square-footage, questions remain. The Big Pharma-turned-GE hasn't yet proven that it has a new, sustainable lease of life, far from. But that it's daring to try--well, that deserves a gold-plated* DOTY award, surely? (*not really)

2009 Exit/Financing DOTY Nominee: Lundbeck/Ovation and the March of the CVRs

It's time for the IN VIVO Blog's Second Annual Deal of the Year! competition. This year we're presenting awards in three categories--that's 300% more fake prizes than last year!--to highlight the most interesting and creative deal making solutions of the year. The categories are: Big Pharma Deal of the Year, M&A/Alliance Deal of the Year, and Exit/Financing Deal of the Year. We'll supply the nominations (roughly half a dozen in each category throughout December) and you, the voting public, will decide the winners (by voting early and often, commencing once we've announced all the nominees). Strap yourselves in, it's The Race for the Roger™.
We think what we'll do for this one is give you about 60% of this nomination post now, and if all goes well with the rest of the nominations and we hit certain targets--X thousands of votes, clicks and whatnot, then you'll get another 20%. If the nomination of Lundbeck's acquisition of Ovation wins, then you'll see another 10%. Of course to get the full nomination, you'll need those guys to provide a killer acceptance speech.

We think you see where this is going. You want the full monty, you gotta EARN IT.

Ah, the earn-out. Not new, for sure (though it seems to have a new, flashy name: contingent value rights [CVR]), but earn-outs were so common earlier this year that it was fair to wonder if they were now a de facto part of every biotech acquisition.

Lundbeck's acquisition of Ovation--our first nominee in the 2009 Exit/Financing DOTY category--boasted a biobucks figure of $900 million. No doubt there was a large down-payment ($600mm) but a substantial sum rested on the regulatory progress of Ovation's epilepsy drug Sabril.

And that's one of the reasons we chose Lundbeck/Ovation over a raft of potential CVR-laden deals (see, among others, Sanofi/BiPar, Sanofi/Fovea, CombinatoRx/NeuroMed, The Medicines Co./Targanta, Onyx/Proteolix, Alcon/ESBATech). We've got no word on whether Ovation's shareholders have received all or only some of that $300 million (GTCR invested $150 million in the company in 2002), but it seems quite probable that they got a fair chunk.

Sabril was approved by FDA in August with a REMS to help mitigate the risk of peripheral blindness, a known side-effect of the drug. So: the CVR-boosted deal structure was established to allow Ovation and Lundbeck to share the risk associated with that approval. The REMS itself was well-anticipated given the rocky history of the drug (which Ovation licensed in from Aventis in 2004) and Sabril is now on the market--second line for epilepsy and first line for infantile spasms, a condition for which the drug has Orphan designation. Folks, we have a winner.

CVRs ought to flourish in tougher economic times, as pharma can place more pressure to share risk on investor syndicates eager for exits. But these aren't usually the typical biobucks figures we're used to seeing tacked onto alliances or in-licensing deals. As Ovation's deal demonstrates, CVRs can be used to bring parties together around binary risk events like drug approvals or clinical trial success. In other words, earn-outs help smooth out differing views of product development or regulatory risk, and help deals get signed that otherwise might languish.

Why vote for this deal? For starters, CVRs aren't going away, even should biotechs become increasingly buoyant if/when public investor dollars return to the IPO scene. And we do hear rumblings that pharma might rather NOT do earn-out heavy acquisitions thanks to some accounting factors that mean they'd have to report future payments as liabilities.

But acquisitions will remain the favored VC exit. And we'd bet our crafty pharma-friends will find a way around those accounting issues, if they exist. And so instead, we'd suggest, get to know CVRs. Embrace them, even. A vote for Lundbeck/Ovation is a vote for the dominant biotech-pharma acquisition structure of 2009, and very likely a vote for the future of biopharma acquisition structures, too.

2009 Big Pharma DOTY Nominee: Dollars for Donuts

It's time for the IN VIVO Blog's Second Annual Deal of the Year! competition. This year we're presenting awards in three categories--that's 300% more fake prizes than last year!--to highlight the most interesting and creative deal making solutions of the year. The categories are: Big Pharma Deal of the Year, M&A/Alliance Deal of the Year, and Exit/Financing Deal of the Year. We'll supply the nominations (roughly half a dozen in each category throughout December) and you, the voting public, will decide the winners (by voting early and often, commencing once we've announced all the nominees). Strap yourselves in, it's The Race for the Roger™.
This is a no-brainer. The biggest deal for Big Pharma hands down in 2009 is the $80 billion deal struck by the brand name trade association PhRMA as its contribution to health care reform.

We call it "Dollars for Donuts" because a key element of the deal is the industry's commitment to offer a 50% discount on drugs purchased by Medicare beneficiaries in the Part D coverage gap, a.k.a. the "donut hole" in the prescription drug benefit for seniors and the disabled.

Okay, okay, its not a traditional biz dev opportunity, we admit. But if Big Pharma dealmaking is about anything, it is about paying up front for access to new commercial opportunities downstream. And this deal fits that model perfectly.

We've covered the deal itself extensively in The RPM Report, but in a nutshell, PhRMA agreed to the donut hole discount, to pay bigger rebates on drugs purchased by the Medicaid program for low-income families, to accept a pathway for follow-on biologics and to an excise tax on prescription drugs dispensed in the US. That is the $80 billion.

Of course, like any good deal, that top number includes a lot of biobucks. The $80 billion is tied to how the Congressional Budget Office scores the legislation, and includes some creative accounting. So the donut hole discount is scored as saving money for the government (even though it directly saves money for Part D beneficiaries). And PhRMA gets credit for the savings from follow-on biologics, even as its members salivate over using the new process to jump start their investments in biologics.

This also counts as an options-based deal, since Congress will have the final say on exactly what ends up in the legislation--and we figure that $80 billion price tag will go up to at least $100 billion when all is said and done. But, despite what you read, this really is part of the deal. PhRMA may hope to hold the line at $80 billion, but knew darn well that there would be pressure to add more. And, assuming the extra money comes in the form of rebates on Part D to help close the donut hole altogether, it only means that industry will end up paying more to get more.

And what did PhRMA buy? A bigger market in the US.

First off, filling in the donut hole is good for business. Generic drug dispensing in Medicare Part D is running above 70%, and manufacturers at least are convinced that they are losing business because of the real or perceived impact of the coverage gap. Obviously PhRMA would prefer not to pay rebates or offer deep discounts, but eliminating that gap is worth paying for. That's why we're convinced that dollars-for-donuts will happen even if health care reform itself collapses.

But for now at least health care reform looks inevitable. And health care reform means more people will have insurance (like 30 million more) and those with insurance will have better insurance (no more lifetime caps, more predictable copays, better coverage for products like vaccines). And companies don't need much of a boost from that coverage to recoup their investment in support: by our math, it will only take four new monthly prescriptions a year per newly insured life to make up the entire price. (Read our analysis here: it's hot off the presses.)

But like any classic drug development deal, the payoff is a few years away. The new coverage doesn't kick in until 2014--just when Big Pharma will be coming out the other side of the patent cliff. So think of this like the Pfizer/Wyeth deal: a big upfront investment that helps to position Pfizer for life after Lipitor. Only this investment will help position the entire industry for life after reform.

So Dollars for Donuts is a very big deal--and a very good one to boot.

2009 M&A/Alliances DOTY Nominee: GSK/Concert and the Option-Based Orchestra

It's time for the IN VIVO Blog's Second Annual Deal of the Year! competition. This year we're presenting awards in three categories--that's 300% more fake prizes than last year!--to highlight the most interesting and creative deal making solutions of the year. The categories are: Big Pharma Deal of the Year, M&A/Alliance Deal of the Year, and Exit/Financing Deal of the Year. We'll supply the nominations (roughly half a dozen in each category throughout December) and you, the voting public, will decide the winners (by voting early and often, commencing once we've announced all the nominees). Strap yourselves in, it's The Race for the Roger™.
We’re cheating a bit on this one. For even though the nomination goes to GSK’s deal with Concert—a harmonious June deal indeed—it’s also a nomination that represents the Big Pharma’s entire 2009 listing of option-based deals. Why do they deserve your vote? Because they’re flexible, low-cost, risk-mitigating, pay-for-performance-oriented and, frankly, we think just rather clever. They’re also a very definite sign of the times.

In brief: GSK (or whomever; they’re not the only ones doing these deals, but they’re among the most prominent) pays a small fee up-front in order to take an option, or several options, on one or more partner compounds (typically pre-clinical). This secures for GSK a pre-defined licensing deal down the line—but only if it wants it, i.e. if the data look good. If they don’t, GSK has only lost relatively small change. If they do, GSK not only secures an asset that would otherwise very likely attract other interest, but does so at a pre-agreed price, which would arguably otherwise be higher. And the partner runs (& funds) the R&D program in the interim.

The Concert deal’s on the rich side, but typical in structure (and that’s why it’s such a perfect template): GSK paid $35 million up front (including $16.7 million in equity, another way to spread risk) for options on three projects, the most advanced of which started Phase Ib in November this year, the least advanced of which hadn’t even been selected at the time of the deal. GSK can opt into these programs at clinical proof-of-concept (or slightly earlier, at Phase I, for the lead). If it does, Concert begins to access various slugs of milestone money, mostly tied to clinical and regulatory achievements. So the biotech got $12 million a month or so ago for starting Phase Ib on the lead; its total milestones may reach over $1 billion.

This isn’t just a risk-sharing deal structure, it’s risk-sharing deal content, too: Concert’s compounds are mostly deuterated versions of existing molecules (the lead is a version of Bristol’s HIV drug atazanavir, for instance)—meaning it has replaced hydrogen atoms with deuterium atoms, creating new, patentable chemical entities that skirt existing IP and that may even be safer and/or more effective than the originals.

Beyond the Concert deal GSK has an orchestra of others: Chroma (Jun 09), Protea Vaccine Technologies (Jun 09), Vernalis (Aug 09) or SuperGen (Oct 09) for example. And don't overlook the dual-melody rare disease pact with Prosensa (Oct 09), which comprised a straightforward licensing deal and an option component. For a recent addition to the group, check out the November GSK/Nabi deal, which includes $40 million up-front for the option to license smoking cessation vaccine NicVAX, currently in Phase III.

image from flickr user greenbloodman used under a creative commons license

2009 M&A/Alliances DOTY Nominee: J&J/Elan's 18% Solution

It's time for the IN VIVO Blog's Second Annual Deal of the Year! competition. This year we're presenting awards in three categories--that's 300% more fake prizes than last year!--to highlight the most interesting and creative deal making solutions of the year. The categories are: Big Pharma Deal of the Year, M&A/Alliance Deal of the Year, and Exit/Financing Deal of the Year. We'll supply the nominations (roughly half a dozen in each category throughout December) and you, the voting public, will decide the winners (by voting early and often, commencing once we've announced all the nominees). Strap yourselves in, it's The Race for the Roger™.
First up on our list of worthy candidates is a nominee for the M&A/Alliance category: Johnson & Johnson's July purchase of Elan's Alzheimer's immunotherapy program (AIP) via a stock purchase plan that gives the health care giant an 18.4% stake in the biotech.

Why is this interesting? For starters, the deal's complicated structure helps both J&J and Elan hedge against risk. In return for roughly $1 billion in capital (slightly less after Elan got into a tussle with BiogenIdec about a potential change of control to Tysabri), J&J is creating a new co focused on Alzheimer's immunotherapy, with a near-term focus on the interesting, but still very risky Phase III antibody bapineuzumab.

Elan benefits because it doesn't have to fork over all the upside to its Alz program, given the biotech retains a 49.9% stake in the newco and also has a 49.9% share in its profits or losses.

Elan also also gets significant help funding bapi's development with this deal. With J&J committing another $500 million to the antibody's Phase III trials that molecule will have to rack up $1 billion in costs before Elan has to pay another penny (Recall, Elan partner Wyeth (now Pfizer) pays the other half of the development costs.)

Most importantly Elan gets much needed capital to tackle the thorny issue of its ticking debt clock. Certainly a simple asset sale wouldn't have triggered the same boatload of money--with back-end loaded deals the preference, you can bet a significant amount of the cash tied to licensing bapi would hinge on FDA or EU approval, which is still years away. Thus, any other deal structure--except the whole-sale acquisition of Elan--would have left the biotech in need of cash to shore up its financial position.

But J&J would have had to fork over a lot more than $1.5 billion to take Elan in-house. And it would have ended up paying a pretty penny for additional infrastructure and programs it didn't really want. With this deal, J&J, which before this had only a modest R&D presence in Alzheimer's, brings an experienced group of some 70 development experts to a therapeutic area that it's pegged as being critical to its future. But by limiting the deal to AIP, J&J doesn't buy unwanted--and costly--excess capability. Moreover, given this newco (of which we still don't know the name) could easily be spun out of J&J, there's the potential for even more value creation not solely limited to bapineuzumab's success in the marketplace.

And should Elan's other Alz programs take off, that's okay, too. J&J's equity stake in the biotech means it will share in Elan's success, but as a financial investor, not as the owner of the technology.

Think of it as a new alternative to the Roche/Genentech structure. But because J&J is limiting its stake to 18%, it remains a minority shareholder so there aren't the thorny issues about board control and ownership that remained a constant source of friction for both Roche and Genentech.

The J&J biz dev team is clearly enamored with the clarity provided by The 18% Solution. Nearly three months after the J&J/Elan tie-up, the pharma cut a similar deal with Dutch player Crucell, taking an 18% stake in the company in exchange for building capacity in another hot therapeutic area: vaccines.

So why does J&J deserve the DOTY for the M&A/Alliance category? Because long before other Big Pharmas, J&J's realized that sometimes owning just a piece of the pie is more beneficial than paying too much for the whole thing. Mmm, pie.

Pie image courtesy of flickrer jacqueline-w used with permission through a creative commons license.

IN VIVO Blog's Deals of the Year 2009: The Race for the Roger

Oscar, Schmoscar. It's the Race for the Roger

Welcome to the beginning of the second annual IN VIVO Blog Deal of the Year competition. It's bigger and better than ever before! Not familiar with the 2008 DOTY competition? Read all about it here (start at the bottom and work your way up, if you like suspense).

Starting later this week we'll be nominating deals in multiple categories: one for financing related deals and two M&A/alliance-dominated categories. Once all the nominees have been posted for each category we'll open up the voting for you, our dear readership, to decide the winners. Voting will stay open for a couple weeks over the holiday season and we'll announce our winners (and provide them a forum for an acceptance speech, naturally) in early January.