Bayer's 3rd-qtr income down 35% on Schering AG buy, while sales climb 26%

German drugmaker Bayer says that, for the third quarter of 2006, its net income was 320.0 million euros ($419.0 million), down 35% from the 493.0 million it recorded in the year-earlier period. The company attributed the decline to charges associated with its 16.9 billion-euro acquisition of fellow German firm Schering AG (Marketletters passim). Despite this, the company's earnings for the quarter were still ahead of the consensus estimate of 195.0 million euros from a Bloomberg analyst survey.

3rd-qtr sales up 26%

In addition, Bayer reported that the purchase of Schering had added 1.41 billion euros to its third-quarter sales, which rose 26% to 7.78 billion euros. The firm went on to say that its health care division, which saw turnover increase 72.5% to 3.48 billion euros, had been the main performance driver for the period. The group's pharmaceutical sales were up 137.5% to 2.44 billion euros, with growth of the hemophilia A drug Kognate (recombinant human Factor VIII), as well as Schering's drug's Yasmin (drospirenone and ethinyl estradiol) and Betaferon/Betaseron (interferon beta-1b), highlighted as key to the expansion.