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Novartis pharmaceuticals news

November 25, 2013 8:00 AM UTC

During an investor day, Novartis announced the creation of four new business segments and provided an update on its portfolio review. The pharma will create dermatology, heart failure, respiratory and cell therapy segments to go along with oncology. Novartis said the business segments give the ability to commercialize multiple products in a therapeutic area at better margins. The pharma said that the dermatology segment has peak sales potential of $2-$3 billion; the heart failure segment has peak sales potential of $2 billion to over $5 billion; the respiratory segment is $2-$4 billion; and the cell therapy segment has "blockbuster plus" peak sales potential.

The pharma added that it has not finished its portfolio review but has started to identify undisclosed programs that may be discontinued or externalized. Novartis said it doesn't want to "rule anything out" on either its animal health or OTC business being in or out of its portfolio. Consolidating worldwide research sites, optimizing its manufacturing footprint and leveraging scale in procurement are expected to deliver about 3-4% of sales in productivity per year through 2015. The company did not disclose additional details of its R&D consolidation announced earlier this month that could affect over 550 positions at research facilities in the U.S., U.K. and Austria (see BioCentury, Nov. 11). ...