TEVA: Te vas a enterar por qué estamos donde estamos..., del modo de hacer las cosas.

PFIZER’S corporate jet is at the disposal of its chief executive, Jeffrey B. Kindler, for business travel and a limited number of personal trips. Top Merck executives also have use of that drug maker’s corporate aircraft.

But when William S. Marth, the chief executive of the largest prescription drug supplier in the United States, travels cross-country, he flies commercial. On trans-Atlantic trips, Mr. Marth, who runs Teva North America, shuns first class, opting for business class instead.

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Mr. Marth oversees one of the most important divisions of Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, an Israeli enterprise that, despite not being a household name, is the biggest generic drug maker in the world. Teva has secured its rise through aggressive acquisitions, strategic discipline, quality control, low prices and an infectious devotion to corporate frugality.

“We’re kibbutzniks,” says Mr. Marth, 55, an Irish Catholic who grew up in Chicago and not on a citrus grove in the Negev. “Frugality doesn’t mean doing less. It means doing as much or more with less.”

“We are aggressive and not everybody likes us,” Mr. Marth says. “But we are doing something every day that lowers health care costs and helps consumers.”

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