Abbott's Humira set to be top-selling drug

ABBOTT LABORATORIES’ $9-billion arthritis drug Humira is set to take the crown as the world’s top-selling medicine this year, highlighting the dominance of costly biotechnology products as revenues from old-style pills decline.

Neither of last year’s biggest sellers – Pfizer’s cholesterol fighter Lipitor or blood thinner Plavix from Sanofi and Bristol-Myers Squibb – will even make it into the top 10 in 2012, according to consensus forecasts compiled by Thomson Reuters Pharma.

The dramatic shift in the sales landscape, triggered by a record wave of patent expires, will be centre-stage during the forthcoming quarterly results season as investors weigh up how leading pharmaceutical companies are adapting.

“They’ve all seen this coming but their ability to manoeuvre is limited,” said Simon Friend, global pharmaceutical leader at PricewaterhouseCoopers. “It’s a tale of two worlds . . . there is certainly a rush to streamline costs and step up looking for new products.”

Roche, the first Big Pharma to report sales figures today, is relatively well-placed in the new era, given its leading position in biotech and cancer drugs, which it hopes to consolidate by buying gene sequencing firm Illumina.

Roche has three anti-cancer drugs in the global top 10 with Rituxan, Avastin and Herceptin. Others are less fortunate.

Pfizer is already feeling the loss of Lipitor, after the US patent ran out in November, while for Sanofi and Bristol the first three months of 2012 were the last full quarter of US Plavix sales before cheap generics hit.

Bottom of the pack is AstraZeneca, trading on just seven times this year’s expected earnings. It has already warned that earnings will fall by more than 10 per cent in 2012 as its antipsychotic Seroquel and other drugs face generic competition.

Abbott’s Humira, by contrast, is on a roll. Analysts expect the US firm to report first-quarter revenue from the injectable medicine up 11 per cent from a year ago and worldwide sales, including those booked by Japan’s Eisai, are forecast to reach $9.3 billion this year.

The medicine is expected to retain its market-leading position through 2016, by which time it will rack up sales of $11.75 billion. – (Reuters)