General Election: Only Scottish patients are getting the best new drugs on the NHS April 27, 2015 Terminally ill people in Scotland are being given the best new cancer drugs, while those in the rest of the UK are being deprived of them. This apparently unfair difference stems from the way drug provision by NHS England and NHS Scotland is regulated, with Scotland's drug monitoring body making it much easier for [...]
AstraZeneca share price dips despite rise in profits and unchanged outlook April 24, 2015 AstraZeneca had a successful start to the year, but competition means growth will be slow. The figures The Anglo-Swedish drug maker's operating profit went up by 15 per cent to $933m (£620m) during the first three months of the financial year, with revenue also rising by one per cent to $6bn. This is a [...]
General Election 2015: AstraZeneca boss Pascal Soriot distances himself from Conservative supporting Telegraph business leader letter April 2, 2015 The boss of one of the biggest companies in Britain has said he is not backing the Conservatives, despite his name being included in a letter signed by 100 business leaders backing the party's economic policies. Pascal Soriot, chief executive of AstraZeneca, said his name should not have been included in the letter, which was [...]
AstraZeneca and TSB help London reverse declines – London Report March 12, 2015 UK SHARES rose yesterday, led by challenger bank TSB after it received a takeover offer, and by drugs group AstraZeneca on optimism about key trial results. Shares in TSB, which was spun off from Lloyds and listed at 280p per share last year, rose 23 per cent to 326p after it received a takeover bid [...]
AstraZeneca chief executive Pascal Soriot gets £3.5m after fending off Pfizer March 10, 2015 The head of drugs giant AstraZeneca was given a £3.5m payday last year after he fought off a hostile takeover bid from Pfizer. Pascal Soriot’s pay packet was up from £3.3m the previous year and consisted of an annual bonus of £1.9m, equivalent to 170 per cent of his base salary, according to the firm’s [...]
How GSK and AstraZeneca might stop advancing treatments if drug spend is reduced February 19, 2015 Big pharmaceutical companies thrive off the invention of new drugs, but their success relies on those drugs being purchased at the end of the line. If the maximum amount spent by the NHS on new medicines was seriously lowered, as a report released today suggested, it would not only limit access to some [...]
AstraZeneca loses its US patent rights for asthma drug Pulmicort Respules February 16, 2015 AstraZeneca is considering an appeal against a US court ruling that found its patent for asthma treatment Pulmicort Respules is invalid in America. The British pharmaceutical giant said it “strongly disagrees” with the decision and is considering its options. In a statement yesterday, Paul Hudson, president of AstraZeneca US, said: “AstraZeneca has full confidence [...]
AstraZeneca in $7.9m payment to settle US case February 11, 2015 AstraZeneca yesterday settled a five-year legal battle between its US division and the US Department of Justice over claims it provided kickbacks to Medco Health Solutions, for $7.9m ($5.2m). The firm had been accused of giving kickbacks to Medco to ensure it kept sole and exclusive status for its Nexium heartburn medication on lists of [...]
AstraZeneca hit by generics as revenues drop February 5, 2015 ASTRAZENECA ended an interesting year in a downbeat manner as fourth quarter results revealed the company sustained a loss during the three months ending 31 December. Last year saw the UK’s second largest pharmaceutical company successfully fend off a £69bn takeover bid by US drugs giant Pfizer and get approval for a record six new [...]
AstraZeneca puts new gene editing technology to the test with drug research programme January 29, 2015 Earlier today, British pharmaceutical firm AstraZeneca announced plans to use a new gene-editing technology to develop drugs for a variety of diseases. Called Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (Crispr), it allows the targeted editing of specific genes. When a gene is known to be involved in causing a particular disease, it will [...]