Reuters reports that a number of big-name drugmakers, including Pfizer, Sanofi and Takeda plan to raise drug prices to start the year. According to the report, the price hikes apply to more than 500 drugs. Excluding different doses and formulations, the reach extends to more than 140 brands of drugs. Reuters said healthcare research firm 3…
GlaxoSmithKline officially rebrands as GSK
GlaxoSmithKline (NYSE:GSK) has long gone by its acronym GSK. Now, the abbreviation is the company’s official name. GlaxoSmithKline had announced its plan to change the name in an earnings announcement in April 27. The London Stock Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange will update the company’s name in “due course,” as the company explained in…
GSK to name Vishal Sikka to its board
GlaxoSmithKline plc (LSE/NYSE:GSK) has announced that the CEO of Vianai Systems, Vishal Sikka, will join its board as a non-executive director. Vianai Systems is a Bay Area startup focused on ‘human-centered AI.’ Sikka will join after GSK spins off its consumer segment, which it will term ‘Haleon.’ At GSK, Sikka will provide perspective on AI, which…
Roche to donate essential medicines to Ukraine
Roche (SIX:RO, ROG; OTCQX:RHHBY) announced that it would ship 150,000 packages of the antibiotic Rocephin to Ukraine, among other medical supplies, including diagnostics. Rocephin is a broad-spectrum cephalosporin antibiotic. The World Health Organization cites it as an essential medicine. Basel, Switzerland–headquartered Roche noted in a statement that it is working with various international and local…
GSK names consumer health spinoff ‘Haleon’
GlaxoSmithKline plc (GSK) is moving forward with a planned demerger of its consumer healthcare segment, which it will call Haleon. The company notes that the name is a portmanteau of the old English word ‘hale’ and the name ‘Leon.’ The former means ‘healthy’ while the latter is a reference to strength. In the past eight…
GSK rebuffs Unilever’s offers to buy its consumer healthcare arm
GlaxoSmithKline (GSK; NYSE:GSK) plc announced that it had received three unsolicited proposals from Unilever plc (LON:ULVR) to buy its GSK Consumer Healthcare unit for £50 billion (about $68 billion). GSK rejected the offers, explaining in a statement that the proposals “fundamentally undervalued” the business unit. Last year, the division generated £9.6 billion in revenue. Despite…
Pharma 50: Here’s how the world’s largest pharma companies are doing
The global pharmaceutical industry held up well during the pandemic, with 10 of the largest businesses only seeing a roughly –3% drop in revenue in 2020. Eight of the 10 even came out ahead. That’s one of the big takeaways from our sister publication Drug Discovery & Development’s inaugural Pharma 50, a compilation of data…
How COVID-19 sidelined top vaccine manufacturers
Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna were the first to win emergency use authorization from FDA for COVID-19 vaccines. Johnson & Johnson recently got its own permission to distribute its vaccine. But other Big Pharma companies have struggled to get vaccines to the finish line, including some of the world’s largest vaccine makers such as GlaxoSmithKline, Merck and…
Biden announces $4B to support global vaccinations worldwide
President Joe Biden announced that the U.S. is set to provide $4 billion to the COVAX Facility to support access to safe and effective COVID-19 vaccines. Money appropriated by a December 2020 Congressional vote will comprise an initial $2 billion contribution to Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance for the COVAX advance market commitment (AMC) covering 92…
Which companies will likely produce the most COVID-19 vaccine in 2021?
Since the beginning of the pandemic, much of society has pinned its hopes on the availability of a vaccine. Now that several are available across the world, there is hope, said Dr. Anthony Fauci, chief medical advisor to President Joe Biden, in a recent JAMA interview. “There’s light at the end of the tunnel.” One thing that…