Why is the pharmaceutical industry turning its back on the UK? September 18, 2025 Since coming into power last year, Rachel Reeves and Keir Starmer have consistently stressed the importance of the life science sector to the UK economy, viewing it as critical for growth. In its aim to boost the industry’s standing, Labour pledged to make the UK an attractive place for investment and innovation, and to increase [...]
GSK plots $30bn investment into US in latest blow to UK’s pharma sector September 17, 2025 GSK has unveiled a new plan to spend $30bn (£22bn) on research and manufacturing facilities in the US. The London-based business said the capital would be deployed over the next five years and would create hundreds of high-skilled American jobs in areas such as AI and advanced digital technologies. The investment of £4.4bn per year [...]
Big pharma’s devastating retreat from the UK September 16, 2025 Merck and AstraZeneca’s withdrawal from UK investment is a warning signal to Rachel Reeves – but is she listening? Asks Oliver Dean Both AstraZeneca and Merck’s decision to abandon their respective UK expansions is more than a corporate setback. It is a catastrophic loss of jobs, investment and future innovation and the public are now [...]
Astrazeneca pauses £200m Cambridge investment September 13, 2025 British drug giant Astrazeneca has paused a planned £200 million expansion of its research site in Cambridge in a fresh blow to the UK pharmaceutical industry. It comes after the pharmaceutical firm abandoned plans to invest £450 million in a vaccine plant in Merseyside earlier this year in a blow to the Government as it [...]
Merck warns UK is ‘not internationally competitive’ as it scraps £1bn London research centre September 10, 2025 Merck has pulled out of a planned £1bn London drug research centre in the latest blow to the government’s growth agenda. The US pharma giant is to lay off 127 staff alongside abandoning the construction project, which had been set to open in King’s Cross in 2027. The firm warned the UK would lag behind [...]
Pharma stocks suffer as Trump demands prescription slash August 1, 2025 Pharmaceutical stocks across the global markets have taken a hit after Trump demanded drug companies lower prices for American consumers. Trump’s threat against pharmaceuticals has given healthcare sector investors “a dose of the blues” after his letter to various company bosses. It outlined that they should either cut US prescription prices or face a tariff [...]
Could Astrazeneca completely switch its allegiance to the US? July 30, 2025 The UK’s largest listed companies are turning their heads towards the glimmer of the Nasdaq after growing impatient at the lacklustre performance of the London Stock Exchange. Chief among them is pharmaceutical giant Astrazeneca, which cancelled plans for a Liverpool vaccine plant due to lack of economic support earlier this year and has expressed frustration [...]
Astrazeneca plots huge $50bn US investment after ditching UK expansion plans July 22, 2025 Astrazeneca has unveiled plans to invest as much as $50bn in manufacturing and R&D in the US after ditching its UK expansion plans in a blow to the government’s industrial strategy. The Cambridge-based pharma giant said it will spend the huge sum over the next five years, including on a new manufacturing facility in Virginia, [...]
Trump tariffs: FTSE 100 holds steady as pharma and metals brace for levies July 9, 2025 The FTSE 100 opened 22 points up this morning, despite threats of pharma and metals tariffs with stark implications for major stocks on the blue chip index. President Trump has said that an announcement is coming “very soon” on pharmaceutical tariffs – with a possible 200 per cent rate landing in “about a year”. Major [...]
These charts show the scale of the London Stock Exchange’s decline July 9, 2025 In May, one of the London Stock Exchange’s smallest constituents decided to leave. Brighton Pier, which had been listed on the exchange’s AIM market with a £5m market cap, delisted and jumped ship to private securities venue JP Jenkins. “It’s something that had been building up for quite a while for the past several years,” [...]