From Tony Ortega:
"Another tipster left us something interesting in our comment section a couple of days ago. It was an email announcing that a last-minute seminar had been put together, and that in just a few days Scientologists could attend a conference on the cruise ship Freewinds with Scientology super-donors Bob Duggan and Grant Cardone."
"We were stunned when we saw that email. We knew that Duggan had recently sold his cancer drug company, Pharmacyclics, for about $21 billion and so perhaps he has some time on his hands, but it seemed extraordinary that Scientology could get him and Cardone, who seems to have about ten different motivational speaking companies going, to appear at a Scientology event on last-minute notice. You would think it would take months to book those guys. But they’re apparently willing to drop everything to hang with their fellow thetans on the high seas. We asked Mike Rinder what he thought of if."
“Yeah, Duggan is also at the ‘WISE Convention’ at the Marriott Burbank Airport. It seems the pressure is on — if they want to be in the ‘Big Being’ Club with Dave and Tom, they need to do more than just give money. You can’t buy status in Miscavige’s church, apparently,” Rinder told us. “But if you think about it, it’s actually thebest way to ensure continued flow of cash from someone with a lot of money. Have them participate in the scam themselves. They are far less likely to balk and walk away from the rip off if they are involved in it. Because if they just continue to be soaked for money, sooner or later they realize they are being taken to the cleaners.”
From Bob Duggan's webpage it sounds like he is no longer involved with Pharmacyclics:
"Most recently, Robert Duggan served as the Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board of Pharmacyclics until 2015. For more information on Pharmacyclics, please visit their webpage: www.pharmacyclics.com."
http://robertduggan.com/
The company that paid 21 billion for Pharmacyclics apparently didn't require or want Duggan to stick around. Duggan got 3.5 billion out of the deal and seems pleased to give his money and time to Scientology. He also seems to enjoy hanging out with Grant Cardone. Proof that someone can make lots of money but still have no "common sense".
Don't read anything at all into Duggan's departure.
The company that bought Pharmacyclics was Abbvie (formerly Abbott). When a small drug company is bought by Big Pharma, the buyer generally wants to keep some of the true experts - the biologists and chemists who invented the intellectual property, and perhaps the manufacturing guys if that's tricky. Sometimes the clinical guys are also brought in, though biotech tends to have less expertise in clinical studies than does Big Pharma.
But the legal and business guys from the startup are bought off and chucked right out - they tend to be Venture Capitalists or other, freewheeling types who definitely do NOT fit in with the bureaucratic, make-no-mistakes-but-make-no-innovations type of bean counters who inhabit the Finance and Legal departments in Big Pharma.
So, whether or not Duggan was a $cilon, Abbvie would have bid him not let the door hit his arse on the way out after the deal was inked. Other than the Co$ connection making them look at the books thrice instead of twice, I don't think Duggan really registered with J&J at all, because he was just another VC opportunist with some IP to sell to them.
Been there, done that, bought an alarming number of t-shirts.
