Roche Announces Positive Q3 Results
Roche have revealed positive financial results for the third quarter, strengthened by the sustained growth of their cancer drugs.
Earlier today Roche announced that sales reached 11.57 billion Swiss francs, an increase of 8%, while their pharmaceutical revenue grew by 9% to 9.03 billion Swiss francs.
Roche’s best-selling drug was MabThera/Rituxan (rituximab), which has been approved for non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and chronic lymphocytic leukaemia in addition to rheumatoid arthritis, and contributed 1.80 billion Swiss francs within the oncology setting, a rise of 12%.
Sales of Herceptin (trastuzumab) for HER2-positive breast cancer grew by 7% to 1.51 billion, while Avastin (bevacizumab) had sales of 1.62 billion. Sales of Roche’s chemotherapy drug, Xeloda (capecitabine), was up 6% to 393 million, while sales of Tarceva (erlotinib), for advanced lung and pancreatic cancer, increased by 5% to 327 million.
Roche’s Lucentis (ranibizumab) for wet age-related macular degeneration leapt 21% to 431 million Swiss francs, while RoActemra/Actemra (tocilizumab) for rheumatoid arthritis, soared with a 33% increase to 267 million francs.
However, the results were not all positive, with Pegasys (peginterferon alfa-2a), for hepatitis B and C, falling 16% to 303 million francs, and the transplantation product CellCept (mycophenolate mofetil) dropping slightly to 216 million francs.
Severin Schwan Roche’s chief executive noted that the demand for Roche’s products has remained strong in both their pharmaceuticals and diagnostics divisions. “We will meet our full-year targets,” he claimed, noting that he was very encouraged by the uptake of Kadcyla (trastuzumab/emtansine) and Perjeta (pertuzumab), Roche’s breast cancer treatments.
Links:
www.roche.com
www.pharmatimes.com