Pfizer's Healthy Growth Lifted By Alliance Products

US drug company Pfizer has announced better-than-expected earnings andrevenues for the third quarter ended September 28, 1997, despite the effects of a strong US dollar. Revenues were $3.09 billion, with net income growing to $596 million, representing increases of 10% and 16% respectively on the corresponding period a year ago. Earnings per share for the quarter rose 15% to $0.46. For the nine-month period, revenues were $9.01 billion with net income of $1.66 billion, up 11% and 16% on the like, year-earlier period.

The company's strong growth was driven principally by sales of its treatment for hypertension and angina, Norvasc (amlodipine), which Pfizer claims is now the largest-selling cardiovascular medicine in the world. Sales of Norvasc increased 22% to $574 million for the quarter. Another boost for the figures was the performances of drugs developed and sold through alliances with Eisai and Warner-Lambert, namely Aricept (donepezil), for the treatment of Alzheimer's disease, and Lipitor (atorvastatin) for patients with elevated blood cholesterol. William Steere, chairman and chief executive, said: "our alliance products are setting records in the marketplace," pointing to the fact that the two products brought in revenues of $95 million. Sales of pharmaceuticals in the quarter were ahead 19% in the USA to $1.34 billion, while international turnover grew 5%, or 12% excluding the foreign exchange impact, to $960 million.

Pfizer also said that it fully expects to launch three new products before the end of 1998: its new antibiotic Trovan (trovafloxacin), Zeldox (ziprasidone) for the treatment of schizophrenia, and Viagra (sildenafil) for the treatment of male erectile dysfunction.