A consulting assessment is advice: produced for one client, shaped to one question, priced to the engagement. An independent rating is a measurement: the same method, the same scale, and the same meaning for every asset it is applied to — placed on a record anyone can examine later. Four differences do the work.
Method
A consultancy adapts its approach to each engagement — that is its value. A rating’s method is fixed in advance and applied unchanged, so the grade means the same thing for every drug it is attached to.
Comparability
A consulting deliverable stands alone; it cannot be lined up against the deliverable another client received. Ratings are built to be lined up — across drugs, across therapy areas, and across time.
The record
Consulting work is private, and afterwards no outsider can examine what was said. Every MARA Rating is dated and stays on the record; later ratings supersede earlier ones rather than erasing them.
Incentives
A rating fee is fixed and never contingent on the grade or on any transaction. The rating is worth something precisely because it does not depend on anyone’s conviction — including the client’s.
Due diligence usually needs both: advisors to interpret a situation, and an independent benchmark that does not move with the deal team’s enthusiasm. A rating is the benchmark, not the advice.