American drug manufacturers think big. Blockbusters such as those offered by Pfizer, Abbvie and Merck & Co. are missing from the Swiss heavyweights Roche and Novartis.
With Keytruda, the US pharmaceutical group Merck & Co. has the best-selling cancer drug in the world.
The two Swiss pharmaceutical giants Roche and Novartis grew at an attractive rate of 8 and 6 percent last year, but they are nowhere near the level of their two major US competitors. Abbvie and Merck & Co. also presented their annual financial statements last week. And both did a sprint in 2021: Abbvie increased sales by 23 percent to over $56 billion and Merck & Co. by 17 percent to almost $49 billion.
How did the two companies do it? Both companies think big, which undoubtedly also applies to another leading drug manufacturer from the USA, Pfizer. The multinational, which will present its financial statements next Tuesday and has made extremely successful bets with its vaccination and a tablet against Sars-CoV-2, has already announced that sales will double to a good $80 billion.
In Abbvie’s case, Humira’s arthritis drug, once again, was a box office hit. In 2021, it became the first pharmaceutical product to achieve sales of more than $20 billion. In view of the fact that Humira’s income is likely to collapse from 2023 due to imitation products, several new growth areas have also been developed. At Merck & Co., Keytruda, the world’s best-selling cancer drug, once again provided momentum. Its turnover increased by 20 percent to more than 17 billion dollars.
Roche and Novartis’ top-grossing drugs, Ocrevus and Cosentyx, made $5.5 billion and $4.7 billion, respectively, in 2021. Both products still have room for improvement, but preparations that promise a similar resounding success as Humira and Keytruda are currently not in sight at either of the Basel-based companies.