Pharmaceutical company intelligence reports from Espicom provide a full review of the company's activities together with five-year sales forecasts for its key products. The company's financial performance is covered in-depth, from its latest results to a complete analysis of its latest full fiscal year and an outlook for the future. A section on company strategy covers mergers, acquisitions and divestitures, key agreements, products and R&D. An overview of key products and R&D is followed by a comprehensive review of the company's product portfolio and research and development pipeline by therapeutic area. In addition, supplementary appendices provide more in-depth information on financials, agreements and corporate events. Following the merger of Ciba and Sandoz, the spin-off of the Agribusiness sector and the sale of the remaining activities of the Industry division, Novartis has become a leading company in the life sciences field and has operations in approximately 140 countries worldwide. Novartis is currently organised into the four divisions of Pharmaceuticals, Consumer Health, Sandoz, and Vaccines & Diagnostics, created following the acquisition of Chiron Corporation. Within Pharmaceuticals, the company's current growth drivers include Diovan (valsartan), Glivec/Gleevec (imatinib), Femara (letrozole) and Zometa (zoledronate).

Novartis' current pharma growth drivers together account for approximately 38 per cent of total pharma sales, and we predict that Diovan and Glivec/Gleevec will continue to demonstrate substantial sales growth within the medium term. In addition, the recent launch and approval of a selection of products which include Exjade (deferasirox), Xolair (omalizumab), Exforge (valsartan+amlodipine) and Lucentis (ranibizumab), should offset the decline in sales of a number of Novartis' strategic products. However, this confidence is tempered by the recent setbacks to the fortunes of Zelnorm/Zelmac (tegaserod), Prexige (lumiracoxib) and Tekturna (aliskiren). In addition, although Galvus (vildagliptin) has recently received approval in the EU, Novartis still faces some hurdles since the approvable letter for Galvus in the US has allowed Merck's Januvia a head start in this important market. Similarly, the delay in US approval for the leukaemia treatment, Tasigna, has left the market open to Bristol-Myers Squibb's Sprycel. In addition, within the next few years Novartis will be facing increasing generic competition for many of its current top selling products such as Zometa (for hypercalcaemia of malignancy, bone metastases and Paget's disease), the blood pressure treatment Lotrel and Famvir, the antiviral drug for treating herpes, to name but a few.

In the longer term, as a research-intensive company which has benefited from the Chiron acquisition, Novartis has a strong pharmaceutical pipeline with a total of 138 compounds under development. With a number of projects in late-stage development, of particular note is fingolimod, which is under Phase III development for multiple sclerosis.