Company profile
SEC EDGAR ↗- Industry
- Pharmaceutical Preparations
- Listed
- NYSE: MRK
- Incorporated
- NJ
- Headquarters
- Rahway, NJ
- Fiscal year end
- Dec 31
Financials
FY2025- Revenue
- $65.0B
- Net income
- $18.3B
- Total assets
- $136.9B
| Fiscal year | Revenue | Net income | Total assets |
|---|---|---|---|
| FY2025 | $65.0B | $18.3B | $136.9B |
| FY2024 | $64.2B | $17.1B | $117.1B |
| FY2023 | $60.1B | $377.0M | $106.7B |
| FY2022 | $59.3B | $14.5B | $109.2B |
| FY2021 | $48.7B | $13.0B | $105.7B |
| FY2020 | $41.5B | $7.07B | $91.6B |
Reported fiscal years from SEC filings (10-K) — SEC EDGAR ↗. Stratrix is a strategy publication, not a real-time financial data service.
Decisions on record
2 verified Decision Cases on Merck, and the casebook each one belongs to.
| Fork date | Decision type | What Merck chose | Where it stood | The story | Casebook |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2001 | Crisis Response | Keep selling with label warning | Merck settled an investor class-action for $830 million (2016) | Read the story → | Crisis Response Casebook → |
| 2020 | The Fork | Leveraged spinoff of Organon | Merck announced it would carve out a separate cancer division to manage Keytruda exposure (2026-02) | Read the story → | The Fork Casebook → |
Videos on Merck
Run one of these yourself
The decisions Merck faced, as kits you can run.
Each pack takes one of these decisions and gives you the framework, a deck for the room, a model that resolves to one number, and the sourced cases behind it. $499, one-time.
Decision ForksThe CannibalizationShould you launch the thing that takes revenue from your best business?See the pack →Crisis & ReinventionThe Crisis ResponseWhat is one more quarter of not acting worth?See the pack →Moat & CompetitionThe Moat AnatomyWhat would it actually cost a challenger to take your customer?See the pack →
The analyses
The Cannibalization Choice · Growth & Portfolio
Merck Loaded $9.5 Billion of Debt Onto Organon and Pocketed $9 Billion on the Way Out
The story is a tidy strategic divorce: Merck shed slow-growth women's health to focus on oncology. The real move was a leveraged cash grab — Merck loaded ~$9.5 billion of debt onto Organon and pocketed ~$9 billion of it on the way out the door.
7 min
The Crisis Response · Crisis & Reinvention
Merck's Vioxx Recall Is Taught as a Model of Responsibility. The Paper Trail Says Otherwise.
The story is that Merck pulled Vioxx the moment it found cardiac risk. The paper trail says it found the first signal in 1999, got an FDA warning in 2001, and withdrew in 2004 — after five years and $100M-a-year in ads.
8 min
The Moat Anatomy · Moat & Competition
Merck Already Survived Its Worst Drug. The Best One Is the Real Danger.
Vioxx peaked at $2.5B and nearly broke Merck. Keytruda now throws off $29.5B — 46% of all revenue — and its core patent expires in 2028. The comforting analogy is backwards: the blockbuster is the bigger threat, not the scandal.
8 min
Tools to try
- Ansoff move finderFramework: Ansoff Matrix
- Business model canvas builderFramework: Business Model Canvas
- Change readiness checkFramework: Kotter's 8-Step Change Model
- Five Forces scorerFramework: Porter's Five Forces
- SMART goal builderFramework: SMART Goals
- SWOT builderFramework: SWOT Analysis
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