Comment by mbreese

I’m not going to defend Fisher here. It was a stupid thing for someone to do.

But unless you’re in the field, you won’t realize exactly how big ThermoFisher actually is. They are the major supplier of everything for molecular biology work. From freezers (the Thermo part) to plates and pipettes (Fisher) to enzymes and antibodies. In many ways they are like Amazon. They sell everything. Some of it from outside companies, but a good deal of sales are from in-house brands. They could use their position as a reseller to know which products sell the best and with the highest margins.

In a company of this size, it’s easy to have one group feel pressure and cheat on running the gels to confirm results. Particularly when the real results are ambiguous or dodgy. It’s not a good look, but I doubt it will put a dent in people from buying things (non-antibodies) from them.